K-State milling program revives Western Star Seasoned Flour, once made at Salina's Western Star Mill
SALINA, Kan. — A seasoned flour once milled in Salina is back on sale, this time from Kansas State University's milling program in Manhattan.
The Kansas State University Milling Science program announced on its Facebook page that it will sell Western Star Seasoned Flour during its holiday flour sale. The post said the product "was previously produced by the Western Star Mill in Salina but was discontinued a few years ago," and that "this year, Kansas State Milling was given the recipe to produce and sell." The post did not say who provided the recipe.
The program describes the product as "a preseason flour blend with ingredients to help with binding," and says it "is great for breading meat and thickening gravy." Product photos in the post show 5-pound bags labeled "Western Star Seasoned Flour," from the Department of Grain and Food Science.
More than a century of milling in Salina
The Western Star name in Salina dates to at least the early 1890s. A Kansas Historical Society history of Kansas milling says Western Star Mills, a rival of the Salina Mill and Elevator Co., ran 15 double sets of steel rollers and had reached 300 barrels of flour a day by 1892.
John J. Vanier secured controlling interest in the Western Star Milling Co. in 1925, according to the Kansas Historical Society's Kansapedia. The company "had been struggling" and became profitable under his influence, Kansapedia says, and Vanier later added the Weber Flour Mill and the Salina Terminal Elevator Co. to his holdings.
Joe Hale joined the Vanier family business, Western Star Mill Co., as vice president after he and Joyce Vanier married in 1951, according to the KSU Foundation. Archer Daniels Midland acquired Western Star in the early 1970s, and Hale was later named president of ADM Milling, becoming company chairman in 1989 and retiring in 1996, the foundation said.
On April 25, 2019, ADM announced it would end production at its Salina flour mill, along with its Nokomis mill in Minneapolis, as its new mill in Mendota, Illinois, neared opening. ADM said the three mills it was closing were all more than a century old and that "the age of those mills significantly constrains our operations."
The Western Star name at K-State
The Western Star name now hangs on the building where the revived flour will be picked up. The Kansas Board of Regents approved renaming K-State's Global Center for Grain and Food Innovation as the Western Star Global Grain and Food Center on Feb. 11, in honor of J.J. Vanier, according to the KSU Foundation.
"We are deeply honored that this remarkable new facility will carry the Western Star name, a name rooted in our families' history and in Kansas' longstanding leadership in agriculture," the Vanier and Hale families said in a joint statement released by the foundation.
The university held a ribbon-cutting for the 178,000-square-foot, $130 million center on Sept. 18, according to the trade publication Milling and Grain. It houses the milling science teaching laboratory and pilot mill, along with bakery, food science and feed programs.
How to order
Orders are due by noon Monday, Nov. 2, according to the university's online order form, which says "there are no exceptions." The form limits Western Star Seasoned Flour to four bags per customer "due to the high demand." Customers pay at pickup. The form and post do not list a price for the seasoned flour.
Pickup is from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Nov. 16-18 at the Western Star Global Grain and Food Center, 1430 Claflin Road in Manhattan, assigned by last name: A-G on Monday, Nov. 16; H-O on Tuesday, Nov. 17; and P-Z on Wednesday, Nov. 18. Customers who cannot make their assigned day can email [email protected], the form says. The order form is at kstate.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_cLMqNRNTXzsIyfY.
