Bread is one of our most basic and fundamental foods, and the truth is, most bread sucks.The industrial food industry has engineered it into a food-like substance, a far cry from the simple, life-giving sustenance that our ancestors once relied on for survival. Store-bought bread has no integrity. The flour is usually bleached (bleached!) and its often loaded with preservatives, conditioners and other chemicals that trick your brain into thinking what you're eating is fresh. Thanks to these ultra-processed foods, allergies and sensitivities are on the rise. It's time we got back to basics. Real, honest bread has been around for thousands of years and is making a comeback. It's a vibrant food, crafted by hand using time-honored techniques and made with wholesome, high-quality ingredients. Yes bread should taste good, but it should also be good for you. The soul of bread is in the grain, and that's what I'm going to study.

If you're reading this, I am currently riding my bike across the US to visit one of the leaders of the craft bread movement: a stone-ground flour bakery and mill-maker in the Green Mountains of Vermont called Elmore Mountain Bread. There they quarry naturally-present veins of granite to build bread-focused stone mills, and then make delicious, nutritious bread using locally grown and fresh-ground grain to feed their surrounding community. In Michigan where I was born and raised, we are blessed with fertile soil and a diverse agricultural economy. In the six years that I've been studying bread and bread-making, I have travelled around the world to learn the craft. To San Francisco. To Quebec. To France. And now, to Vermont. With this next expedition under my belt, I am hoping to return to Metro-Detroit at the end of the summer and start my bakery, but I need your help. The costs of starting a food business are prohibitive, and I don't want to rely on a bank, paying interest to people that I don't even know. Instead, I'm hoping to raise money from my community in order to afford a big beautiful oven, the centerpiece of any great bakery. 

I realize there are many causes more worthy of donation than mine. There are a lot of big problems in the world, and food is just one small piece of a bigger, broader puzzle. What I can promise is that 10% of all contributions to my campaign will be donated to the Greening of Detroit, a non-profit that aims to plant trees in the city. I've spent time working as a volunteer with this organization, and I can attest to their integrity and professionalism. There's still hope to return bread to its rightful prominence as our most basic and wholesome form of sustenance. Join my initiative to bring a real bread bakery to the Metro-Detroit area, and let's bake something special together. Thank you. - Max