Dr. Stephen Jones and Jonathan Bethony will teach a sold-out Bread Bakers Guild class, “Milling and Baking with Local and Specialty Wheats,” at the Bread Lab in Mount Vernon, WA, on June 15-16. The multi-faceted class will include an introduction to the Bread Lab’s plant breeding research program, a tour of the field where thousands of varieties of wheat are being grown, a rheological evaluation of the wheat, and a whole grain milling and baking practicum.

Stephen Jones is Director of the Washington State University Research and ExtensionCenter in Mount Vernon, WA , and holds a PhD in genetics from the University of California at Davis. His research in plant breeding has been featured in the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times.

Jonathan Bethony is the resident baker at the Bread Lab at Washington State University-Mount Vernon. He is a graduate of the San Francisco Baking Institute’s Professional Training Program and has developed artisan bread programs for bakeries in the San Francisco Bay Area.

The Bread Lab is part of the WSU-Mount Vernon Research Center plant breeding program, which studies the diversity of locally grown grains to determine those most suitable for baking. The goal of the Bread Lab is to combine science, art, curiosity, and innovation to explore ways of using regionally available grains to move the craft of whole grain bread baking and other grain usage forward.

For more information, visit www.thebreadlab.org/

“Milling and Baking with Local and Specialty Wheats” is part of The Guild’s 2015 class series, Revival: What’s Old Is New, which includes hands-on artisan bread and pastry classes blending traditional and contemporary ideas, as well as classes that share valuable practical information for professional bakers. These classes are part of The Guild’s mission to “shape the skills and knowledge of the artisan baking community.” Please visit www.bbga.org to see the complete 2015 events calendar.