My Midlife Musing

IFBC 2012 in Portland Oregon.   2.5 days of engaging and enlightening interaction with food bloggers.  Just wow!

Conference started Friday afternoon and continued jam-packed until Sunday afternoon.  Friday started with lunch hosted by Organic Valley but not before I oohed and aahed at the Oxo table.   LOVE OXO products and have for years.

OXO Display @ IFBC

Organic Valley’s lunch was to introduce its cheese slices  and, keeping with that theme, lunch was grilled cheese and apples.  Although delicious, there were no offerings for attendees with dietary concerns (gluten-intolerance, vegan, etc).

Best moment – running into MeganTheGFVegan, a charming food blogger from Canada I met in June!  I didn’t know she was coming (note to self: read attendee list next time).

Next best moment?  Chatting with my tablemates about Doctor Who.  Wheeeeeeeeeee! I didn’t expect to meet Whovians at a food blogger conference.  Candace, author of the blog, Candace Karu, and Tara, author of the blog, TeaRelish, are devoted Whovians and our 10-15 min chat was so much fun.  Even better, Candace works for the Cabot Creamery Cooperative!  Talk about some great cheese.

The live food blog event showcased Oregon products.  10 companies each had 5 minutes to pitch their products while we tweeted or blogged about them.  Fortunately for me, most of them ship outside the state.

PEOPLE! Ya’ll need to check out the following:

1. Jacobsen Salt Co – hand-harvested Sea Salt from the Oregon coast.  Domestic salt that competes with better known European sea salts.

Jacobsen Salt Co

1. Rogue Creamery – Oregon Blue Cheese that will knock your socks off
2. F/V Sonia’s Wild Albacore Tuna – this was the most amazing canned tuna you will ever eat.  It tastes fresh, slightly salty and delicious.
3. Packer Orchards & Bakery – the Spiced Vanilla Pear butter!  Awesome
4. The Schmid Family Farm – the marionberry jam with cream cheese on crackers.

Following all this deliciousness, I went to my 1st session: Building Community Online and Offline presented by Keren Brown of Foodportunity and The Frantic Foodie.

What a great session!  Keren is an animated outspoken speaker with lots of great ideas for building a community.

My purpose for going to the conference was twofold: to learn more technical blogging aspects and, more importantly, to connect with other bloggers and build relationships.   Keren’s session was perfect.