Local Business Spotlight: American Flatbread at Lareau Farm

The Vermont Pizza Story That Started With an Oven in a Backyard

Before American Flatbread became a name recognized well beyond Vermont, there was an experiment.

George Schenk wanted to cook with wood.

In 1985, he built an outdoor oven at his home and started working through an idea that would eventually become American Flatbread.

The first oven raised a fairly important question:

Would this actually work?

It did.

Four decades later, you can still follow that story back to Waitsfield.

It Started Before "Farm-to-Table" Became a Catchphrase

Schenk was working at Tucker Hill when his experiments with wood-fired cooking developed into what became Flatbread Nights.

The idea was uncomplicated: good ingredients, bread, fire and people eating together.

Those nights caught on.

Larger ovens followed, including a massive outdoor oven built at Tucker Hill in 1987. By 1990, people were lining up for flatbread, and the operation was beginning to outgrow its original setting.

Eventually, the restaurant found its permanent home at Lareau Farm in Waitsfield.

And Lareau Farm Has a Story of Its Own

American Flatbread didn't move onto a blank commercial property.

It moved onto one of the Mad River Valley's historic farmsteads.

The farm traces its beginnings to the 1790s and Waitsfield's first physician, Simeon Stoddard. The large red barn arrived later in the 19th century and once served a dairy operation.

Today, the 25-acre property includes the original American Flatbread restaurant, the Inn at Lareau Farm, gardens, event space, trails and the Big Red Barn.

In other words, dinner is only part of the reason to go.

Forty Years Later

American Flatbread celebrated its 40th anniversary in 2025.

That's significant because plenty has changed since those early nights cooking outside.

The business expanded.

Frozen flatbreads put the name into grocery stores.

Other American Flatbread restaurants eventually opened.

And wood-fired pizza went from something unusual to something you'll now find almost everywhere.

Yet the Waitsfield location still brings the story back to where it began.

Fire.

An earthen oven.

A farm.

And people sitting down together.

The Benefit Bake Tradition

One part of the American Flatbread story that I particularly like has little to do with pizza.

The company has a long history of Benefit Bakes that use the restaurant to raise money for community organizations and causes.

That philosophy goes back decades and reflects Schenk's belief that a restaurant can be more than a business selling food.

It can participate in the community around it.

That's a very Vermont idea.

More Than Dinner

The Lareau Farm property makes this experience different from simply walking into a pizza restaurant.

Depending on the season, you can find gardens, walking and mountain-bike trails, the inn and art exhibitions in the Big Red Barn.

The restaurant currently operates Thursday through Sunday evenings, so this is one place where I'd check the current schedule before making the drive.

Then I'd arrive with enough time that dinner isn't the only thing you see.

⭐ Nathan's Hidden Gem: Get There Before You're Hungry

Don't pull into Lareau Farm five minutes before you want to eat.

Come early.

Walk around.

Look at the barn.

Take in the gardens and the Mad River Valley surrounding the farm.

Knowing that people have worked this land since the 1790s changes the experience a little.

Then go eat the pizza.

You'll probably appreciate both more.

Why American Flatbread Belongs in the Waitsfield Story

There are restaurants that could be moved to another town and barely change.

American Flatbread wouldn't be the same somewhere else.

Its story grew from the people, farms, food culture and landscape of the Mad River Valley.

That's why, after 40 years, Lareau Farm still feels like the right place for it.

American Flatbread didn't simply open a restaurant in Waitsfield.

Waitsfield became part of the recipe.