Grainz Gathering 2025

On 10- 11 November, we’ll be coming together in Pomonal and Marnoo for two nourishing days of conversation and connection around all things grain. This time, we’re hosted by the wonderful team at Blue Wren Bakery, a micro bakery committed to local grains, and we’ll also be visiting Burrum Biodynamics who grow delicious grain and care deeply for their landscape.

Grainz Gatherings are for anyone with a passion for grain and a vision for a better food system: farmers, millers, bakers, brewers, chefs, academics, and grain curious eaters alike.

This gathering’s theme is resilience- in our farming systems, food networks, and communities. Pomonal was recently affected by bushfire, and as we gather here, we’ll be looking at how the food and farming community have been affected and exploring how our grain community can support regeneration and renewal.

Tickets include breakfast and lunch over the two days, plus a dinner on the Monday night.


Speakers:

Laura Valli- Postdoctoral fellow at University of Missouri and former rye-searcher at WSU Bread Lab

Delphine Sicard- Research Director at French National Institute for Agriculture, Food, and Environment

Nick Shelley and Jackie Lazarus- Baker and co-owner of Blue Wren Bakery

Steve and Tania Walter- Farmers at Burrum Biodynamics

Robert Pekin- Founding Director of Food Connect

Chris and Gabrielle Moore- Co-Founder and Managing Director Sailors Grave Brewing

 
Schedule and more speakers to be confirmed soon!

Speaker Bios:

Laura Valli is an interdisciplinary researcher exploring food systems through an anthropological lens, with a focus on cultural, ecological, political and embodied dimensions of grains. She is interested in both the production and consumption of food, and the ways in which our eating habits impact our own bodies and identities as well as our communities and other species. Laura earned her PhD at Washington State University, working with Dr Stephen Jones at WSU Breadlab, where she examined the role of rye in localized food systems. Her dissertation discusses the meaning of rye for breeders, farmers, millers, bakers and eaters - those who sustain relationships with this often overlooked grain. After graduating, she joined the Center for Regenerative Agriculture at the University of Missouri to work on expanding access to conservation cost-share funding.

She is the co-instructor of the 5-week undergraduate course Rye: Cultural History and Embodied Practice at Yale University. Laura has shared her research and perspectives on grain networks, small-scale food systems, and the meaning of rye with audiences ranging from academics and practitioners to curious eaters, in the US and internationally. For her, rye is both identity and a teaching tool. And perhaps most importantly, a way to connect with others.

Delphine Sicard is a Research Director at INRAE, UMR SPO in Montpellier, France. Her research work combines microbial ecology, population genomics, experimental evolution, and participatory research to explore the ecology, evolution, and adaptation of yeasts in fermented foods.

 For more than 15 years, she has worked closely with bakers and farmer-bakers across France to study and preserve the microbial diversity of sourdough bread.
Her work has shown how bread-making practices shape sourdough yeast communities, as well as the nutritional and organoleptic benefits of sourdough.
Her recent projects include studies on sourdough bread terroir and the evolution of the sourdough yeast species Maudiozyma humilis and Maudiozyma bulderi.

Tania Walter learned conventional farming practices on her grandparents farm near Skipton, Victoria.  Moving to Marnoo in 1989 allowed her to bring those skills into the shearing kitchen and yards. Studying the Biodynamics Standard allowed the farm partnership with Stephen to achieve a full National Organic Standard in 2008 and subsequent improvements in personal and soil health gave us plenty of energy to begin an on-farm grain cleaning business. There was very little interest in 2013 for grains so Tania entered the Farmers Market scene to find a customer base, educating people on preparing and cooking with farm fresh seeds.  Tania continues to be principle manager of Burrum Biodynamics, is the local gym instructor and spends as much time as she can with her 2 grandsons.

Stephen Walter is a fifth generation farmer at Burrum on Wotjobaluk Country.  Stephen began full time conventional farming with his parents at the age of 16.  In the mid 90s an visit from Biodynamic Founder Alex Podolinsky inspired Stephen to begin applying prepared Biodynamic 500.  Creatively working with nature re-energized Stephens love of growing food and enabled him to get off the chemical treadmill.  After the floods of 2010/11 he took a leap of faith and built a cleaning facility and Burrum Biodynamics was started.  During the 2020/21 Melbourne Stephen and the Burrum Biodynamics team dispatched 317 pallets of food to help sustain Melbourne in lockdown.  Feeding people continues to give him purpose and networking with bakers is very rewarding.  Stephen has lived on the property all his 61 year of life and enjoys motorbike riding.