from local stores.
A year ago, four places in town stocked them. Including Whole Paycheck. The local coop was the best, they have a bulk department that takes up an entire aisle and have stocked them for decades. But no more wheat berries. The guy who manages that dep't doesn't know why. They have rye berries, spelt berries, einkorn berries, but no wheat.
The only place left is Natural Grocers, prepackaged in 2-lb plastic bags.
I guess not many folks (or bakeries) are milling their own. Sigh.
Interesting you had it available before. I have only rarely seen wheat berries in the store. Exceptions have been WinCo in AZ (25 lb bags or those weigh-it-yourself dispensers, along with other bulk grocery items), and those smaller bags at Natural Grocers you mentioned. Most of the home milling crowd I am familiar with (elsewhere) usually have theirs delivered, because it is hard to just walk in and buy. There does seem to be ongoing discussion in those arenas about where to get certain mills, grain to mill, etc etc., so I guess so e level of interest is still out there.
It might also be a seasonal thing? Winter wheat varieties are either still dormant or barely getting started growing. Supplies of last year's summer wheat varieties might be getting a little low about now. Our local NG had trouble sourcing rye berries for several months but those are back in stock now. NG has offered to order wheat berries for me in bulk in the past, but I haven't tried that yet.
Seasonal? Maybe in the case of the coop, but I've never seen them run out before, and they've been out for 2+ months. Whole Foods cut their bulk dep't in half, and got rid of many bulk grains. (That's ok, I didn't like going there anyway...)
So now it's NG or delivered. The latter is quite a bit more expensive. Sigh....
I am .... "thrifty" when it comes to sourcing wheat berries. Wonderful sounding grain gets a hard pass when it's too spendy for our budget.
Central Milling has wonderful grains to choose from, and has been my go-to most often. Their best pricing does require a bulk purchase... I just did the math on a 50# bag of hard red spring wheat berries delivered to my house. Current pricing with delivery charges included works out to $1.52/lb. That's a little cheaper than NG pricing at the moment. It's a lot of wheat but it stores well and we do go through it. They sometimes have things on Amazon but current pricing there is higher than on their website.
Oh and Azure, that co-op some people order from. That is a serious no go for me. Some people get fabulous grain from them, but that was not my experience. The hard red wheat, hulled barley, and oat groats were all terribly dirty, with a lot of stems and chaff included in the mix. They weren't issuing refunds for such things then ("it's natural and to be expected" 😠) and ap arently refunds can be spotty even now. My personal take away: Never again.
Best wishes in your wheat berrie research!
I've bought from Azure and Central, with good results in both cases. I felt Central's quality was a tad better, but that is not from a direct comparison. Buying 50 pounds at a time is not in the cards for me... maybe 20-25 at most. Thanks berry much - we'll figger it out :)