Flying Squirrel Bakery serves up farm-fresh food

TALKEETNA — Rachel Campbell slides a pizza into the wood-fired oven at Flying Squirrel Bakery in Talkeetna.

“Best move ever,” she says of her decision a little more than a year ago to leave a seven-years-long career working in Anchorage high-end restaurants to bake at the Flying Squirrel.

She said it was the owners’ dedication to local food crafted with care that first attracted her to the place.

“It’s tied to the farm, which is a main reason I decided to step down and come out this way,” Campbell said. “This place is so go-local, and amazing that way.”

Owners Anita Golton and Brian Kingsbury have built everything here from scratch.

Kingsbury cleared the trees and built the structure the bakery resides in. It’s tucked into the forest on the side of Talkeetna Spur Road, the road that connects the small town of Talkeetna to the Parks Highway.

Golton said she and Kingsbury tried to keep as many trees on the land as possible when they were clearing it for the bakery’s construction.

“We tried to do what we could to keep it feeling natural,” Golton said. “You look out the window, and you see birds on the trees. There are trails for Talkeetna Lakes Park accessible right from our back door. We give a discount to people who arrive here by non-motorized means, as a local incentive to get people outside and riding bikes and skiing and things like that.”

The wood-fired oven was hand-built by Golton and Kingsbury.

“Anita taught me how to bake bread in this oven,” Campbell said. She specializes in the pizzas that Flying Squirrel serves up in the evenings on Thursdays and Fridays, and in its savory baked goods.

“Something about wood-fired ovens, and baking directly on that stone hearth, really creates a moist interior and crusty outside,” Golton said. “It colors the bread beautifully. But the quality of the bread that comes out of the oven is something most people seem to really appreciate.”

When I stopped by the Flying Squirrel on Friday, Jan. 13, it was an unplanned excursion. I sipped the coffee, black – “Oh! This is literally the best coffee I’ve ever tasted. What is this?” I asked Golton.

She said she serves K Bay Caffe from Homer. How I’ve lived in Alaska my entire life without ever trying it before, I don’t know, but now I’m a believer. I tried Golton’s Vanilla-flavored New York style cheesecake next.

Again, literally the best. Cheesecake. Ever.

So of course I came back.

Twice.

On Saturday, I brought the family along, and we tried the wood-fired pizza, and my husband had the bakery’s sparkling rhubarb-aid. The pizza comes whole-grain or gluten free. We picked up cookies and a gluten-free black brownie for the desserts. On Sunday, we were back for more pastries, including a savory affair with organic smoked mozzarella, onion and potatoes sourced from the owners’ farm.

A good deal of the food at the Flying Squirrel is made from scratch, from locally-sourced ingredients, with many of them coming straight from the owners’ family farm.

The rhubarb in the sparkling rhubarb-aid? That comes from the Kingsbury family farm, called Birch Creek Ranch. So do a lot of the vegetables and berries used in the Flying Squirrels ever-changing seasonal menu.

Other locally-sourced ingredients include spent grains from the Denali Brewing Company, barley grains from Alaska Flour Company, and birch syrup and chaga for steamers, chais and teas, from Alaska Wild Harvest.

Golton said her husband started reworking the farm to transition it toward more vegetable crops as the couple was getting ready to open the Flying Squirrel, which has been around since Aug. 2009.

“It’s a challenging proposition, farming in Alaska in general,” Golton said, “but in Talkeetna in particular, because where they are they’re off-grid. Electricity was never brought out there. That’s made it challenging. But it’s beautiful. You can see the Talkeetna Mountains, Bald Mountain. It’s skirted by Birch Creek.”

The bakery might be out of the way to some – about an hour and a half drive from the Palmer-Wasilla area – but it also has a delivery program to pick-up spots in Anchorage, Eagle River and Willow, which people can order through the website.

Golton said like many who travel to the Last Frontier, she came up to Alaska, fell in love with it, fell in love with someone, and stayed. She worked as a baker and graphic designer for much of her adult life, she said. The Flying Squirrel is the culmination of a dream she’s carried with her since before she came to Alaska.

“I wanted to do something that was a bit more European, a bit more focused on natural foods,” Golton said, “and a bit more catered to the foodie culture, where people are really interested in trying new things, and inspired by locally-sourced ingredients as much as possible.”

For more information about the Flying Squirrel Bakery or to sign up for their delivery program, go to www.flyingsquirrelcafe.com. The bakery also hosts a monthly Second Saturday art show; the next show features local painter Steve Durr. The opening will be held on Feb. 11 from 3 – 5 p.m.