’Tis the season for eating, and with Thanksgiving fast approaching, it’s time to make a menu. This year, no matter the size of your feast, you can make your meal extra special by using Oregon-grown ingredients that aren’t just healthy but also support local businesses, preserve open spaces and help keep the state beautiful. With pasture-raised turkeys, unique cranberries, potatoes and more, you can make your holiday feast one of the most memorable yet. Here’s how.
Let a Farmer Help You Pick a Turkey
Champoeg Farm, located in St. Paul about 30 minutes south of Portland, maintains a sustainable operation that continues to raise turkeys from chicks to adults the old way, letting the birds roam a new pasture each week in summer to forage for grasses, grains and insects. Add in some local wheat, oats, alfalfa and corn, and the diet — along with all that sunshine and exercise — will impart a deep, rich flavor, the farmers say. To get a Thanksgiving turkey, you’ll need to make a reservation.
While you’re out at the farm, take some time to wander around Champoeg State Heritage Area, a bucolic swatch of towering oak trees along the Willamette River less than 3 miles north. (It’s pronounced “sham-POO-ey,” by the way.) Champoeg Farm originally included this land in 1856, when the family let turkeys graze on the acorns. Don’t miss a trip to the nearby Oregon Garden to wander among a stunning array of Northwest trees and plants — or plan an overnight stay at the Oregon Garden Resort. It may only be Thanksgiving, but the Christmas Market in Silverton will be in full swing with its 1.5 million lights starting the week before Turkey Day.
Marion Acres in Hillsboro also sells farm-raised turkeys and offers tours on select dates. Elsewhere around the state, HolmesStead Ranch near Bend, A&M Family Farms near Eugene and Totum Farm in Philomath also sell pasture-raised turkeys. If you’re looking to harvest your own, Eastern Oregon is a wild-turkey hunter’s dream.
Give Thanksgiving Dinner a Colorful Pop With Oregon Cranberries
The temperate climate and fitting soil along Oregon’s South Coast have made the region one of the most prized places in the country for cranberries, growing roughly 40 million pounds of this Thanksgiving essential.
To get yours, plan a trip to Bandon and Port Orford, where much of the farming of these deep-red beauties happens. Head to Peter’s Cranberriesfarmstand in Sixes, near Bandon, to buy them by the gallon, as well as a range of cranberry products like jams and barbecue glaze. The farm is also a stop along the Wild River Coast Food Trail, which includes other producers that form the “Berry Byway.” Bowman Farms, about 6 miles south of Bandon, offers tours of its cranberry bogs, while a farm stand sells the fresh berries, syrups and more. Plan ahead to attend the annual Cranberry Festival in September in Bandon. While in town, sample the cranberry cider brewed at Bandon Rain. The Itty Bitty Inn in North Bend often has it on tap for guests, too.
On the North Coast, Cranberry Kitchen in Warrenton sells the berries, many of them dried, as well as trail-mix bags featuring the fruit. You can often find the products at farmers markets in places like Astoria, Beaverton, Cannon Beach, Manzanita, Lake Oswego and Seaside.
Potatoes and Pumpkin Pies That Never Disappoint
How lonely would all that gravy be without a healthy scoop of mashed potatoes on your plate? You can up your game this year by making the creamy (or chunky) staple with Oregon-grown varieties. In the fall of 2024, the potato became the official Oregon state vegetable, with more than 2 billion pounds of them grown in the state annually.
You can find Oregon-grown potatoes at almost any farmers market, but be on the lookout for a particularly special one, the Ozette, which is also sometimes called Makah. It’s a fingerling-style potato harvested by Indigenous people in the Pacific Northwest for centuries. A good place to check for them is Rubinette Produce in Portland.
For dessert it’s pumpkin pie, of course. You can make it easy and pick up a frozen one from Willamette Valley Pie Company. Lauretta Jean’s in Portland is a perennial favorite, with a crust that’s out of this world. If you’d like to make your own, look for a Willamette Valley heirloom squash, Sweetmeat, which looks like a big pale-blue-skinned pumpkin and makes unforgettable pumpkin pie or soup. You can find it at farmers markets around the Willamette Valley. If you want to make an apple pie instead of pumpkin, fortunately there’s Hood River, famed for its fruit orchards. Check out the Hood River Fruit Loop for ideas on where to go for fresh apples or handmade pies.
