For Francesca Weikert and Blaine Gallivan, it all started with a sourdough starter. The couple began baking bread for themselves and their friends, but their organic sourdough loaves made with ingredients like rosemary, olive oil and sage were too good to keep to themselves. The couple soon began a bread share to meet demand, and that was only the beginning.
This summer, you may have seen Frannie and Blaine working a wood fire pizza oven at either the Saturday Jackson Hole Farmer’s Market or the Wednesday afternoon People’s Market. Their company, In Season Baking Co., bakes fresh sourdough loaves weekly for their bread shares and for sale at both markets (always at the People’s Market and sometimes at the Farmer’s Market, check their Instagram for updates) and now they are adding sourdough pizza’s to their repertoire. In Season Baking Co. uses locally-sourced ingredients whenever possible, as evidenced by their delicious creations like sourdough pizza with roasted peach, dandelion leaf and arugula pesto, Winter Winds Farm goat cheese and Purely by Chance Farm’s Italian pork sausage.
The pizza oven actually belongs to Full Circle Education, a Teton Valley nonprofit that provides greenhouse and garden curriculum to elementary schools in Teton Valley. In Season Baking Co. “rents” the oven and gives a percent of their pizza profits back to the organization, which Frannie (who works for Full Circle Education during the school year) views as a win-win.
Frannie and Blaine are focusing on weddings and events with the pizza oven this summer, where they typically offer guests up to five pizzas, hearty salads and pies from Midnight Pie Co.
Frannie explains, “Blaine and I are both passionate about offering another perspective to the whole gluten craze and reminding people that naturally leavened bread products that are properly fermented are actually a really nutritious and ancient part of our diet.”
Which is why they are particularly excited about their recent partnership with the University of Wyoming’s ancient grain campaign, which is connecting local bakers and farmers to reintroduce ancient grains into Wyoming’s agriculture. Frannie and Blaine just received their first delivery of locally grown spelt, and we cannot wait to see what they come up with.
