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From The Times

May 10, 2003

Working water

Andrew Morgan watches an expert miller in his element

MATT BOWMAN broke out in goose-bumps when he first walked into Venn Mill, near Wantage in Oxfordshire’s Vale of White Horse, and saw the waterwheel, the wooden gears and the ancient elm roof. Some of the curved beams, cut 200 years ago, still have bark on them. Bowman bought the mill on the spot and now he is using it to produce organic and conventional wholemeal flour.

Bowman, 38, is Britain’s youngest independent miller and comes from a family that has been milling for centuries. The craft is in his blood: “I get a strange feeling, like a sixth sense, when I enter any mill, and the hairs stand up on my neck,” he says. “If I see one in the distance, I have to pull over and look at it — otherwise I’d crash.”

For the past 20 years, Bowman has worked in small mills and huge industrial operations, sometimes overseeing 70 machines at a time. Since 1996, he had leased a watermill at Newbridge on the Isle of Wight, supplying local and specialist bakers with wholemeal flour milled from cereal grown on the island. He was selling ten tons of stone-ground flour a month, and the business was flourishing.

But his ambition was to have a mill of his own and he spent years scouring the country for a suitable watermill or windmill.

Now Venn Mill, a large building covering three floors, is the base for his business, Stoneground Flour, and will be used solely for milling throughout the year.

It is the first time Bowman has used a waterwheel to turn the millstones, and before doing so he had to renovate the sluice gates on the Childrey Brook to create a decent enough head of water to turn the wheel.

His range of flours is impressive. He produces stone-ground wholemeal flours, including a spelt — an ancient wheat with a nutty flavour — and a rye flour.

The flours are produced in different grades: coarse for biscuits and cakes; a stronger version for bread making. Bowman also buys in other flours and mixes them to his own recipe to produce a granary-type flour, Venn Mill Malty, made from white and malted flour, wheat flakes and bran.

His organic grain comes from Suffolk and conventional cereal is sourced locally — “I like the idea of grain from the Vale of White Horse being milled in the same area, as in the past,” he says. The Soil Association has already certified his organic operation.

He has kept his Isle of Wight outlets and aims eventually to supply bakers, health-food shops, farm shops and farmers’ markets in Oxfordshire towns. But he won’t be putting on a suit. “I’m sure people would prefer me with a light dusting of flour to give an authentic look,” he says.

At the moment Bowman, his wife, Jacqui and their children, Becky, five, and Luke, two, are living in nearby Stanford in the Vale. However, he has applied for consent for a small house at the mill so he can be on hand to run the equipment as often as possible.

Fortunately, Bowman’s children adore the mill. “Luke starts smiling and shrieking whenever he arrives,” he adds. “I’m sure it’s in his blood as well and, with luck, he may take on Venn Mill to secure it for another generation.”

Matt Bowman: 01235 868789 Venn Mill will be open to visitors tomorrow, during National Mills Weekend and, after that, for at least one day a month all year round.
For information about other mills open this weekend, contact the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings: 020-7456 0909 or 020-7377 1644; www.spab.org.uk/mills/index.html