Week of July 12th – Oregon

I dug into “The Beaver State” without knowing much about it but hoping that I didn’t have to build a celebration around beavers. Now don’t get me wrong, I have nothing against these buck-tooth, wood-eating very busy rodents but they just don’t inspire a song and a dance from me. Which means, its time to move on.

I did, however, find out that Portland has the most breweries of any city in the world and that Oregon ranked third among U.S. states for wine production. Apparently its history of wine making dates back to before Prohibition. Now that’s celebration material.

Partner this with the facts that Oregon is a major player in the salmon fishing industry, that it produces 95% of the hazelnuts in this country and that it’s the second state where you can’t pump your own gas (NJ is the 1st) and this girl is one happy camper.

But there’s more……Add Tillamook cheese, lovingly made in Tillamook, OR and roses representing the “City of Roses”, Portland and you’ve got quite the elegant soiree.

However, I got side tracked with a personal celebration first. During my Oregon exploration I discovered that Oregon is among the 8 states responsible for most of the U.S. production of gemstones. Oregon mines most of the world’s sunstone, a semi transparent gemstone, which ranges in color from yellow, to salmon, to blue-green, all of which appear to be infused with little sparkles from the sun. In addition to sunstone, Oregon produces a variety of different agates, jaspers and chalcedony. I choose a strand of salmon colored Oregon sunstone rondelles to make something for myself at a later date and a white chalcedony and blue opal ring. Yippee for Oregon!

Although Harry & David, probably the most well known food mail order house, is headquartered in Medford, OR, I elected to order my salmon, and smoked hazelnuts from madeinoregon.com. Maybe it’s because they sell an amazing product called hazelnut “unbrittle” which is like a peanut brittle without the filling-removing crunch.

So with the table set with roses honoring Oregon’s largest and “greenest” city – Portland we sat down to a yummy hazelnut-crusted salmon, sugar snap peas seasoned with mint from our garden and a “Chess” Pie made from a recipe from the Highway Cafe in Scappoose, OR. The meal was complemented with the only Oregon wine I could find in St. Louis, and a great find it was, an Oregon Pinot Noir from the King Estate Winery in Eugene, OR.

Color in Oregon with a school of Chinook salmon and again make your way cross country to the “Peach” state – Georgia. 36 down – 16 to go.