European-style bakery opens downtown

by Jill Henry

SBJ Reporter

jhenry@sbj.net

Waves of Grain Bakery & Caf Inc. opened in June at 208 W. McDaniel in the 400-square-foot storefront occupied for four years by Nonna's Bakery & Market.

Philip Dreshfield signed a six-year lease with Mary Faucett, who owned Nonna's Bakery, and he has made arrangements to be the exclusive bread supplier for Faucett's two restaurants, Nonna's Italian American Cafe and Nonna's Bambino.

Dreshfield has similar arrangements with St. Michael's Grade School, an Educational Sports Bar and Grill, which is set to open Sept. 7 at 301 South Ave. Co-owner Jennifer Russo said Waves of Grain was chosen to bake bread for St. Michael's because Dreshfield's products are "unique and fresh."

Other wholesale accounts are being negotiated, but Dreshfield declined to disclose details.

The bakery, which is open for retail sales 8:30 a.m.-4:30 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday, has three part-time employees.

Setting up shop in Springfield, Dreshfield said, was purely by accident. A sales position with PFG-Middendorf, a food service distributor based in St. Louis, brought him downtown often. "I happened to stick my nose in Nonna's Bakery about the time they were actively seeking a creative idea for the bakery" due to the desire of Faucett's daughter, Jenny Faucett, to quit managing the bakery and return to nursing.

"We were amazed at how serendipitous it was," Mary Faucett said. "My daughter had made her decision at about the same time Phil had decided to get back into the baking business."

Dreshfield operated the original Waves of Grain in the Westport area of Kansas City. "I had a very successful little boutique bakery and caf and I've basically adapted the concept and brought it to Springfield," focusing more on wholesale for the moment, he said.

Nonna's Bakery & Market closed June 6 and Waves of Grain Bakery & Caf opened June 7, Faucett said. Dreshfield leases the first floor of the building and kitchen equipment from Faucett. Both Faucett and Dreshfield declined to disclose the lease amount.

"I'm very thrilled about being in center city," said Dreshfield, who made the move to Springfield from Kansas City in 2001. "I think I'm right on the cusp of something incredibly large, both for retail development and of course wholesale development with the number of eating establishments that are rolling into downtown at this point."

Viva la France

Dreshfield fell in love with French bread when, as a student in 1971, he stayed with a French family on the outskirts of Paris. "When I came back to the United States I was pretty disappointed not to find any high-end breads at European-style bakeries," he said.

He earned a master's degree in business administration at the University of Denver and began a career with Vie de France, based in Virginia, opening bakery cafs in Denver, Chicago, Philadelphia, Houston, Dallas and Washington, D.C.

Dreshfield came to Springfield in 2001 when his wife, Kate Renfro, accepted a position as director of corporate communications with Noble & Associates.

"Shortly thereafter, I got a position with Middendorf and became a salesman, where I had the opportunity not only to meet and interact with chefs and restaurant owners around town, but over the years I also studied their bread-buying habits and put together a business plan and decided that I could replace the product that most of the restaurants in town were buying at a very competitive price by creating an artisan-style bread bakery," he said.

Artisan style

Dreshfield defined an artisan baker as "a craftsperson who has the ability to mix and ferment, shape and bake a handcrafted loaf of bread. I think an artisan baker understands the science behind the chemical reactions of the ingredients, (and) probably knows how best to manipulate the environment for maximum development of the bread product itself."

Part of what makes his products unique, Dreshfield said, is his choice of ingredients. "I use flour that exclusively comes from Hodgson Mill in Gainesville, Missouri. I mix my flours. I use more than just one type of flour," he said. "All of my doughs are very unique."

On the rise

Though he has no formal culinary training, "I had the opportunity, by working with Vie de France, to learn from master European bread craftsmen," he said.

Dreshfield plans to expand Waves of Grain, keeping it in the center city area and adding a bistro-style European caf with a line of sweets and pastries.

"Beyond that, there's one final step in the big picture of Waves of Grain," Dreshfield said of his five-to-10-year goals. "Someday I would also like to incorporate a microbrew into an even larger space where I could buy my grains, mill them on location in front of my customers, take some of the grains and convert it into a fine beer, and the rest can be milled and produced into breads and pastries. Because, in essence, beer brewing and bread fermentation are very similar processes. Once you understand the chemistry of one, it lends itself very well to expand into the other."