We have a 26” hand-made Vermont Granite Stone from New American Stone Mills. There are about 100 of these mills currently active in bakeries/restaurants across the US, with us being 1 of 6 places in Colorado! There are less than 100 mills outside of the US from this company. The mill uses Barre Gray Granite, which has an exceptionally fine grain, even texture, and durability. It also has an ideal carving capacity making it popular among sculptors and millers alike — this helps us to be able to upkeep our mill to our exact standards. Granite millstones have a large thermal mass. It is this mass that helps to keep temperature low during the milling process, thereby protecting nutrients in the grain that may be damaged by heat. The owner of New American Stone Mills decided to make his own mill after inheriting a bakery. He searched for a long time for a mill and found nothing that would work for a high-volume bakery while giving impeccable results. He then set out on his own to design a custom mill.

We place full bags of grain, up to 50 to 100 pounds at a time, and crank the mill on. It takes about an hour to mill 50 pounds of grain. We use whole grain for everything, but in the specific case of our croissants, we sift the milled grains through a Tammie to take out any large chunks that may have accidentally passed. This does not mean we are sifting the bran and germ out— we are solely ensuring that it is fine ground for lamination to allow for layers. The sifting process is done by hand and can take anywhere from 17 minutes (that's our bakery record currently made by Izzy) up to 45 minutes.