Welcome to my kitchen…
I have lived in Oregon’s northern Willamette Valley all my life. My great grandmother was born here a few years after the state was admitted to the Union. I grew up on a farm on the Columbia River and have been interested in food and its preparation since I was a little girl watching my grandmother prepare wonderful meals from local ingredients. Many of the recipe I share with you have been handed down to me from my grandmother and mother, both great cooks…not fancy…but masters of made-from-scratch family recipes. And many are the result of my own experience and experimentation in the kitchen.
I have been in the food business in some way or another for most of my adult life. I had a small food manufacturing company for many years and, when I retired from that, I followed my passion and become a vendor in one of the best farmers’ markets in the country. I saw nut roasting machines in Germany when I went there with my mother at Christmas time in 1986. I became addicted to the warm, sugar coated almonds that were roasted on every street corner and vowed to somehow bring that experience home. When I had the opportunity to become a part of my local farmers’ market I bought two roasters and had them shipped home…and the rest is history.
