400 kg of stone-ground flour packed with a smile
Work Party 2-4 September 2022
Friday 2nd saw six of us up at the mill: Kalven, Grant and Andrew as well as Gaye, Elvis and myself. The plan was to mill the balance of the maize from the previous month on the Friday and then to mill the 200 kg of wheat which we had purchased on the Saturday. A good part of the morning was spent lifting both sets of millstones and removing all the old product from the grooves.
Also, the Rotary screens needed to be purged of all the maize meal left behind from the last milling. This took over an hour. Having replaced the repaired plate mill grinding ring we commenced milling maize once more only to discover that we were down on power because the Polela River was so low.Fortunately, by this time Daniel and the Roots team (9 persons doing a gap year) had arrived from Pinetown, so some of these were in-spanned collecting flat rocks to raise the level of the weir. This did the trick and so we finally managed to complete milling the maize. I must mention that the remainder of the Rooties did a huge amount of work clearing alien vegetation and also sanding the slats on the restored Trappist beds destined for the Guest House. On Saturday, Alida, together with Gaye set up a bagging operation and we began to have Reichenau products for sale.
We also set about preparing to mill wheat. This necessitated fitting the screens made by Gavin Chandler (one of the original restoration team from 2007-2009) to the Rotary Sifter. At last we were able to admit water to the turbine and commence milling. Things did not go smoothly however. We had a blocked chute, a slipping cone clutch and screens blocked with flour. Despite this we managed to produce about 100 Kg of flour of different grades, the first Reichenau Stone Ground Flour in 13 years. A satisfying result despite the frustrations: “Despise not the day of small beginnings”
Good News is that Michael and Karin have arrived in South Africa from Germany. It was they who provided the funding to make this mill restoration possible. They will certainly be in evidence around Reichenau in the coming months. A particular project that they will be undertaking is the furnishing of the guest houses for operation as self-catering accommodation.
Autor: Peter Frow
