Grain of truth: farro-ciously delicious

Photos by Donna Campbell

In South Carolina and North Carolina, the cultivation of ancient grains is an expanding enterprise. Some of the earliest forms of wheat consumed by humans—we’re talking grains that fed the pharaohs of Egypt and later, the emperors of Rome--are now growing in the low country of the Palmetto State and in the piedmont of the Old North State. Yes, and there is rice, too, and corn aplenty, but our topic this month is the primitive wheat known as farro. I guess its antiquity was why I was calling it Fair-Oh--like pharoah--until I was corrected ever so gently by the man who cooks the best farro in my Carrboro neighborhood, chef Gabe Barker of Pizzeria Mercato. The proper pronunciation for this ancient grain is Far-Oh. Far back in time, far better than pasta, far more texture: that’s farro.

Farro piccolo in the buff

Without getting mired in plant genetics and taxonomy, let’s just establish that this nutty, delightfully chewy grain comes in three species with ancient monikers--einkorn, emmer, and spelt—sounds like a trio from the Lawrence Welk Show. All are commonly known together as the farro family. Or, as Greg Johnsman of Marsh Hen Mill in Edisto, South Carolina, explained to me, size is the most obvious distinction among the three. “The smallest or piccolo farro,” Greg said, “is also known as einkorn. Medium farro is called emmer, and farro grande is known as spelt.” (Marsh Hen is a fresh produce market that also mills heirloom grits.)

For thousands of years, piccolo farro or einkorn has been a key ingredient in traditional Tuscan soups. This wheat variety produces a singular grain, hence the name “einkorn.” You may also know it by the name “wheat berry.” It is low in gluten and high in iron content.

Emmer, the medium-sized farro, is an ancient, two-rowed wheat, that is usually hulled. It is also low in gluten and high in protein. It can be used for pasta, bread, pilafs, and flatbreads.

Spelt, originally cultivated in what is now Iran and possibly in southeastern Europe, was one of the very first wheats that humans used to make bread. It has the highest gluten content of the three. You can buy spelt grown by Red Tail Grains Farm and Mill of Efland, North Carolina, at the Carrboro Farmer’s Market. Good stuff.

When ground into flour, these grains behave differently from one another, and as Greg of Marsh Hen Mill noted, the three also cook differently. When he says cook, he means boil. To eat farro in a soup, salad, or side dish, you must soak it first and boil it in water, much like dried beans. Indeed, farro works best when soaked overnight before cooking, just like a pot of pintos. It also matters if the farro has been semi-pearled, meaning the husk has been removed, or pearled--meaning both the husk and bran have been separated from the grain. Whole grain farro requires longer cooking, but it presents a more intense flavor and greater nutritional benefits. But enough technicalities. Farro is delicious and it absorbs the flavors of its companions such as lemon, garlic, and onions.

Gabe Barker’s farro salad with fresh green peas and pea greens

I don’t remember ever eating farro until Gabe Barker set up shop. The founder of Pizzeria Mercato in Carrboro, North Carolina, Gabe is still in his early thirties, but his culinary pedigree is deep and impeccable. His parents, Ben and Karen Barker, were the founders in 1986 of Magnolia Grill in Durham, a foodie oasis that quickly became the most distinguished restaurant in the Bull City and regularly nourished visiting celebrities. In 1989 Mikhail Barishnikov came to Durham to play the lead (a cockroach) in the pre-Broadway production of Kafka’s Metamorphosis at Duke. More than once the illustrious dancer came for a post curtain meal on Ninth Street. Ben Barker would soon land North Carolina’s first James Beard Award for Best Chef in the South in 2000. Karen followed in 2003 with her own Beard Award for Best Pastry Chef in the nation. (Though Karen passed away in 2019, her dessert recipes are still a mainstay at Mercato.)

The couple helped to groom some of the finest chefs working in the region today, including their son, Gabe. Twice already he’s been a finalist for the James Beard Rising Star Award for his innovations at Mercato. As you might guess, Barker makes pizza into an art form with toppings that depend on the best weekly produce available across the street at the Carrboro Farmers’ Market. But the menu is not all about the pies. Influenced by his grandmother’s love of traditional southern cooking, Gabe works wonders with such ingredients as lima beans, fresh grilled corn, savory fennel sausage, hot peppers, and pickled red onions. It’s the depth of flavor that distinguishes the dishes.

Gabe told me he learned to prepare farro during his culinary apprenticeship in San Francisco. “I was on a strict budget as an apprentice and had to figure ways to eat on a cost-effective scale.” Gabe learned to prepare a batch of piccolo farro and stash it in the fridge as a foundation for a variety of salads and main dishes all week long. “Farro cooked will keep for five days,” he said. Depending on what else was available, he might add a range of ingredients--squash, apples, kale, dried cranberries, cheese, fresh herbs and lemon, or go the way of cilantro and lime, or a South American chimichurri. Versatile farro can also be tossed with tahini or tzatziki for a Mediterranean meal.

Gabe Barker with a bag of farro piccolo

These days, Gabe’s farro salad at Mercato features his crisp lemon vinaigrette and is mixed with small cubes of pecorino and fresh green peas, served on a bed of pea greens. It is light, refreshing, and delicately chewy. It tastes virtuous.

To prepare the farro for his salad Gabe soaks the piccolo grains overnight and then cooks them about 15 minutes until they are al dente, like pasta. Next the grains are drained and cooled on a tray for about 20 minutes. They are kept chilled in the fridge for the salad making. Farro is amenable to many different flavor profiles.” Gabe said. “It works with Italian parsley, basil, chile flakes, bay leaf, freshly torn mint, chopped thyme and rosemary—so many possibilities with farro as the foundation.”

I recently made a Tuscan-style soup with cannellini beans, ground turkey, onions, peppers, garlic, spinach, and tomatoes.  I tossed in a couple handfuls of unsoaked and uncooked piccolo farro toward the end. Knowing the soup would taste better the next day, I stored it in the fridge overnight—the equivalent of soaking the farro. Reheating the soup cooked the farro perfectly.

The farro I ordered for this test run was from the celebrated Glenn Roberts of Anson Mills in Columbia, South Carolina—also Gabe’s source and a good friend to the Barker family over the years. “Glenn’s constant commitment to quality is hard to come by,” Gabe said. “I know I can count on their products. We don’t often advertise our sources, but Anson Mills is always printed on the menu at Mercato.”

Anson Mills products

Roberts, a University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill graduate, dedicated himself to cultivating heirloom grains starting around 2000 with Carolina Gold rice, a staple from the 1600s which he has now restored to prominence on Low Country menus. Glenn grows a range of international heirloom varieties in a patchwork of fields across Georgia and South Carolina. He offers retail by mail order, including an amazing Cherokee blue corn flour, Benne seeds and red peas from the Sea Islands, pencil cob grits, and many grades of heirloom oats, corn, rye, buckwheat, and benne flour. Improbably, the milling operation sits behind a large carwash in downtown Columbia, in a nondescript sheet metal building that exudes a divine, nutty fragrance. (We drove by on a Saturday, and Donna took a picture.) Anson Mills ships everything fresh on Tuesdays and recommends storing their flours, grits, and other meals in the freezer to keep them at their best.

Gabe figures he goes through about 60 pounds of farro a month at Mercato. “Farro can also be used to make a risotto that’s a little more forgiving than risotto rice,” he said. “You toast it in the pan and gradually add stock to get the soft texture, but you don’t have to stir it quite so diligently.” 

He will also take farro that is already cooked and fry it at a high temperature. “The grain will puff up kind of like Sugar Smacks, a cereal I was not allowed to have as a child.” Gabe grinned. Farro cooked this way will stay crunchy for a week. Gabe uses it to top his fabulous, chilled cucumber salad with herbed buttermilk dressing. “But you can also toss it with cinnamon and sugar and add it as a topping for a tart or ice cream.” Depending on where you are on the gluten tolerance spectrum, farro is more friendly to the digestion than durum wheat, he added.

If you don’t want to experiment with farro yourself, the happy news is that Pizzeria Mercato is reopening in June after a year of pandemic carry out. Or, if you are in South Carolina, Glenn Roberts recommends Terra, a fine dining restaurant run by owner/chef Mike Davis who worked with Highlands Bar and Grill chef Frank Stitt in Birmingham. Anson Mills farro shows up on that menu with some regularity as well.

Author’s note: Food Pilgrim’s book The Month of Their Ripening: North Carolina Heritage Foods Through the Year, is coming out in paperback from UNC Press on August 1.  You can preorder with a discount. See this link.