Inspired by Oregon
THE MEAL
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We wrap up the Pacific Northwest with another salmon-centric meal!
Baked Salmon
Like Washington, Oregon is known for its seafood. Dungeness Crab is the most iconic from the area, but not as available where I am in Indiana. 🙂 Another thing I could’ve done was make corndogs, which were invented in Oregon in the 1930s. But I decided to just do salmon again. Salmon were abundant in the Columbia River and was the first fishing industry in Oregon, peaking in the late 1800s with commercial canning. It’s a versatile fish—you can make it so many different ways—and part of the reason why I wanted to do the states in geographical order was to highlight the local ingredients.
This way of making salmon was the easiest of the three, but still great! Garlic, lemon, and dill come through, but the fish itself is the main flavor. You could definitely eat it with tartar sauce if you don’t like fish “plain”, or use the leftovers to go with salads or sandwiches or something. I’m a big fan of lemon, so I just slathered a bunch of lemon juice on my portion and enjoyed that way. 🙂
Tater Tots
It took me a while to decide what to make as a side dish for Oregon. I considered doing something with hazelnuts, since 99% of all hazelnuts in the US come from Oregon. And then I leaned more toward potatoes because there’s a place called JoJos that apparently makes great potato wedges. I’m not a fan of potato wedges, though, so I went with another Oregon potato invention that I AM fond of—tater tots!
Tater tots were invented in 1953 by brothers F. Nephi and Golden Grigg and Ross Erin Butler Sr., who experimented with ways to use scraps from the French fries they were making at their company, Ore-Ida (which stands for Oregon/Idaho! I never knew that!). The tater tot was a highly successful result. Today, Americans eat almost 70 million pounds of tater tots each year!
Making tater tots from scratch was both easier and harder than I expected. I thought the hardest part would be to get moisture out of the shredded potatoes, get them to hold their shape, and fry them the right amount, but no, that was easy! They turned out just fine! The unexpectedly hard part was shaping them in the first place. The shredded potatoes are so starchy that it just wanted to stick to my hands instead of forming a ball! But I managed. 🙂
From scratch, they weren’t significantly better than just buying them frozen, and it was time-consuming, but I’m glad to know how to make them if I’m ever trying to use up leftover potatoes!
Tillamook Cheese
Of course, no Oregon-inspired meal would be complete without some Tillamook cheese! Oregon is a great place for raising dairy cows, since it gets so much rain and grows such great grass, and Tillamook Valley was especially known for its dairy starting in the mid-1800s. The ship in the Tillamook logo is the Morning Star, which was used to carry cheese from Tillamook Valley to Portland. Now, the Tillamook Cheese Factory produces more than 170,000 pounds of cheese daily!
So, to include Tillamook cheese in my meal, once my tater tots were fried up, I stuck them in the oven with some shredded Tillamook sharp cheddar cheese and added more once that had melted. So yummy!
Blackberry Pie
Marionberry pie would’ve been my first choice for an Oregon-inspired dessert, since they seem to LOVE mulberries over there, but I couldn’t find any in Indiana. Besides, marionberries are a type of blackberry, and Oregon is the #1 producer of blackberries in the US anyway! So it seemed like a good choice.
This pie was really easy to put together, especially since I cheated and used a pre-made pie crust. 🙂 I was happy that it set enough for me to slice so neatly, but it could’ve used some ice cream. It was just a lot of blackberries with only a thin pie crust to go with it. Awesome if you love blackberries, but a little overwhelming if you don’t. 🙂
That does it for the Pacific Northwest! Before heading to the Southwest, we’re going to jump from Oregon across the Pacific to the island territories. Next stop: Northern Mariana Islands!