Please Help Mill Fire Baking Reopen in a New Home

Mill Fire Baking Requests Your Help!

A significant rent increase in December 2023 effectively ended Mill Fire Baking's (MFB) practice of sharing responsibly crafted, naturally leavened bread with our community. Along with the bakery's physical space, MFB lost access to many key pieces of equipment -- e.g., mixers, deck oven, delivery vehicle -- as these, too, were rented.

Hello Friends. I hope everyone is well, peaceful in heart, and kind in action and interactions. My name is Timothy Currie. I've been privileged to operate Mill Fire Baking, a modest artisan bread bakery dedicated to fostering Craft, Connection, and Community in Bend, Oregon. I'm hoping to raise $35,000 to source the needed equipment and materials to reopen MFB and return to serving our community.

The bulk of funds will be used to purchase an energy efficient, steam injected deck oven (~15-18k), and commercial dough mixers (~8-10k), as well as, to cover costs of having those items shipped and professionally installed (~5-7k). Any additional available funds will be used for required smallwares and/ or for securing a more reliable delivery vehicle for transporting bread to where it's needed to help foster local connection and health.

Mill Fire Baking's Ethos & Approach: Community Focused

I am a baker and an educator, focused on the seemingly simple, elemental food that is Bread. For, when approached carefully: Bread is Love. It expresses it. Bread implies connection. It engenders community. Bread is the outcome of processes linking social, natural, and ecological systems in places, through times, and across how livings are made and made meaningful. How bread is made can be revolutionary, suggest intimate acts of love and kindness, and foster healthy and responsible relations in and among people and environments. Mill Fire Baking is committed to learning from, maintaining, and strengthening these connections by a simple, direct approach: employing responsibly grown ingredients; freshly milled flour; high heat; and love to craft humble loaves that are a privilege to share. Bread that is for breaking together; for tilling hope, cultivating love, and growing kindness.

Throughout, I aim to maintain direct, transparent connection to the land, farmers, and practices that produce the basic ingredients I use. All grains are responsibly grown, using organically-minded practices, in the PNW and Northern California. I focus on supporting farmers committed to soil health. No products enter the bakery that use glyphosate, neonicotinoid coated seeds, and toxic pesticides or herbicides – all documented to have deleterious effects on soil, pollinators, wildlife, and humans. It’s the people and practices, the stewardship, that matters most; the lived realities often masked by consumer focus on various certifications.

To further support our Home, it's regional grain economy and political ecology, I work with flour stone-milled in Eugene, OR (Camas Country Mill); Burlington, WA (Carinspring Mills); or, here in Bend by me. Nothing is added to the flour; it is freshly milled and full of potential to sustain and enhance life. I employ long, slow fermentation processes and natural leavening to coax as much flavor as possible from the grains, as well as enhance the nutrient availability and overall digestibility in and of bread. My approach is simple: employing love and care to craft humble loaves I feel privileged to share. I believe these Connections – among field, farmer, miller, baker, and you – matter and should be transparent.

This Spirit of Connection extends to where and how Mill Fire Baking shares its Craft with our Community. I opt for direct interactions at local farmers markets, particularly the Bend Farmers Market and Central Oregon Fill Your Pantry, as well as locally owned and operated produce stands. Spaces that demonstrate how things are brought to market are paramount. Places, too, that afford opportunity to interact, educate, learn, and share; rather than simply sell a commodity. Similarly, my approach to teaching local culinary students focuses on Hope, Love, and Service; aiming to inspire a passion for lovingly crafted bread made using responsibly grown and sourced regional ingredients, a dedication to how we do things that responsibly proceeds what we get in return.

Mill Fire Baking's Future & Role: Responsibility

Facing forward, the goal is to strengthen in commitment and grow in usefulness by remaining focused on craft, connection, and community. I aim to be an employer who provides a safe and engaging environment, living wages, and other benefits; offer a place where students can learn and refine skills through paid internships; and run a bakery that quietly dedicates a growing percentage of its scheduled production, not simply its unsold items, to increasing access to basic, healthy food for those underfed – my 2024 is 1-ton of bread.

Slightly farther afield, I look to acquire a modest commercial stone mill with sufficient capacity to afford local farmers a nearby market option to consider when planning cover-cropping, crop rotation, and overall soil health. A stone mill will also enhance the flavor and overall nutrition of the flour I have available to craft and share as bread with our community, as well as simply an ingredient in itself. Considered as a whole, the aim is always to be useful. For, in truth, Mill Fire Baking is not just about the bread, it’s about the Love and usefulness that a focus on craft, connection, and community afford. This is what matters, and what I ask you to support. My thanks and gratitude, tim