Roof to Table
Portland chef Leather Storrs and his rooftop garden
Farm to Table
Breaking Ground: Oregon Olive Oil
The Oregon Olive Mill in Dayton, Oregon produces olive oil from Oregon-grown olives.
Au Pear
The humble Oregon pear rarely gets its due. The subtle fruit is often overshadowed by the flashy berry or its more popular cousin, the apple. Since pears come late in the growing season, they may get ignored by canners vying for that last box of tomatoes or kids stampeding for the pumpkin patch.
Savoring Blackberries
Sam and Cathy Pennington encountered a series of strange messages when they moved from Colorado to Oregon in 1994. “We kept seeing all these signs that said, ‘blackberry removal,” Cathy Pennington says. “We found it really perplexing. Why would anyone want to remove blackberries?”
On Leavened Ground
It’s 4 a.m. The aroma of fresh bread comes from flaming ovens. Buttery croissants are rolled, cut and shaped by hand at Ken’s Artisan Bakery in Portland. An hour later, the sweet smell of fresh baguette dough wafts past four bakers in jeans, t-shirts and aprons, their heads down, their floured hands dividing and shaping smooth, long loaves. The oven door clanks as the bread goes in.
Artisan Chocolate
Charlie Douglass faces supreme temptation daily. Nearly every morning he has a rendezvous with an enrober, a machine that releases a sensual wave of shining liquid chocolate over row after row of truffle centers.
An Apple Refined
Kevin Zielinski’s eyes light up as he names the apple varieties he tends at his Willamette Valley orchard, just outside of Salem. Champagne Rienette. Douce Moën. Muscadet de Lense. St. Martine. The sinuous vowels and soft consonants even sound delicious. Eventually, they become fluid when Zielinski transforms these French heirloom apples into a traditional sparkling hard cider that leaves many searching for words.
The Oregon Cherry
Bailey’s family has been growing cherries in these hills for more than eighty years, when his grandparents made their first investment in a piece of farmland. Since then, Orchard View Farms has grown to include 2,050 acres in four counties. The orchard is home to twelve types of sweet cherries, from perennial favorites Bing and Rainier to more unusual choices, such as Sweetheart and Skeena.
Oregon Grass-Fed Beef
Jill McClaran wears her blonde hair to her waist and spurs on her cowboy boots. The 27-year-old spends her days in the saddle herding cattle along the basalt rims and airy benches of Hell’s Canyon. Out of cell phone range and hours from the nearest town, this University of Idaho graduate looks over a thousand McClaran Ranch cattle as they graze the rugged and wild eastern Oregon grasslands.
