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In the middle of Our Daily Bread, I got a message from Shelley at Against the Grain Farms in Canada. They’ve been working on restoring old varieties of wheat and barley for the past 31 years and they’re looking to contact farmers and researchers who would like to collaborate in some participatory plant breeding.

What more is there to say? Plenty, of course, but not this time. This is the final episode of this run of Our Daily Bread.

“If your life’s work can be accomplished in your lifetime, you’re not thinking big enough.” Wes Jackson

The qualities that make durum wheat so attractive for pasta have nothing to do with the size of the semolina particles from which it is made.

“I began to dream of a binding machine. I dreamed of it at night and I dreamed of it during the day.”

Sometimes people want bread more than they want democracy. Some governments can’t deliver either.

Eight wheat seeds of silver gets you 5 pounds 10 ounces of bread.

Nathan Myhrvold is right: “The best bread the world has ever had is being made today.”

Bakers who grind their own grain are all utterly in love with the flour they get. I’m jealous.

If you are eating reasonably well, it probably doesn’t matter which you choose. You can get great white bread, and you can get awful brown bread.