Welcome! My name is Melissa and I’m so grateful you’re here!

Melissa Kalder is the founder of Grainful Heart, an intimate baking studio in Chesapeake, Virginia that offers interactive classes for home bakers. As a dedicated home baker herself, an educator, and a community leader who is passionate about people having access and ability to provide nutritious foods to those they love, Melissa masterfully introduces her students to the transformative world of baking everyday pantry essentials using fresh milled flour. 

With over twenty years of baking experience, Melissa began her own journey of replacing all white flours in her home in 2021 when she was diagnosed with gestational diabetes during her third pregnancy.  Prior to becoming educated on fresh milled flour, she sought out quality organic whole wheat and found it difficult to source these products in most local grocery stores. This set her on a path to research mills locally where she could find stone ground flour. It was then that a college friend introduced her to fresh milled flour and its health benefits. Melissa’s big question with two babies and another on the way was…Why would she take on milling her own flour at home? The idea just sounded like an unnecessary extra step in the kitchen when she already had a full plate. However, after learning that any flour purchased in a grocery store – even the organic varieties – is stripped of its nutrients, she jumped in with both feet. In fact, today, Melissa has stopped purchasing flour from the store altogether, and now uses fresh milled flour to make all of the everyday baked goods that her family eats from scratch, including crackers, tortillas, breads, cakes, cookies, cinnamon rolls, and more.

Melissa and her husband Zach are parents to four young children and feel blessed to welcome the Hampton Roads community into their home kitchen as Melissa shows others how easy and rewarding it can be to make better food from home that is simply better for you. Melissa also hosts a Bread Becker Co-op for the Chesapeake, Virginia region, and loves connecting with other local bakers.