When I think of fair food, I think of turkey legs, cotton candy and anything that can realistically be dropped in a deep fryer. Though food isn’t always the main attraction, it’s a quintessential part of the fair experience. But this is the Oregon Country Fair, not a county fair, and those who know OCF know that greasy fried food is hardly the star of the show.

At no other fair can you find 80-plus food booths with meals made with both “love” and organic ingredients. There are more vegan menu items than you can try in a single weekend. Fairgoers rave about “avocado dream boats” and freshly caught fish, while kids run around through paths clutching organic grilled corn on the cob rather than a SpongeBob SquarePants popsicle dripping down their hands. 

For my first Fair experience, I’m determined to find the most “fair” food there is: The booths that have become beloved institutions, the dishes steeped in decades of history, and perhaps a few newcomers just as fresh to the wooded fairgrounds as I am.  

Phoenix Rising Bakery 

Phoenix Rising Bakery is one of the legendary food booths, serving fairgoers since 1973. Located in booth 11, near “The Rabbit Hole” along Wally’s Way and East 13th, the nonprofit sells its famous cookies, donating proceeds to help feed Oregonians through programs like Oregon Food Bank and Food for Lane County, as well as other localized programs, according to booth representative Caitlin Roberts.

“We always joke that we’re not the place to be on a diet,” Roberts says. “We’re all about the sugar and fat and butter and all the tastiness.”

The bakery’s rich treats have become a Fair tradition, but the booth itself has an even longer history.

Paxton Hoag has been part of the Oregon Country Fair for 59 years and was one of the original Phoenix Rising crew. In 1973, Fair organizers asked Hoag’s group, then known as Chow Fun, to provide breakfast, lunch and dinner as an alternative to the main camp kitchen, where fairgoers cooked their own meals over campfires. The first booth was a homemade operation, built around a handmade stove and 200 fire bricks. After a successful debut, the crew packed away the bricks and dismantled the wooden structure until the following summer.

“We came back in ’74, we had found that the Boy Scouts had used the site, we found all of our fire brick in little circles,” Hoag says. “They burnt half the booth, because it really looked like the firewood.”

The setback proved to be an opportunity. In the fall of ’74, Hoag and fellow booth representative Helenita Kassler set to rebuild with the rest of the crew. Kassler, who had moved from Phoenix, Arizona, proposed a fitting new name: Phoenix Rising.

“The booth rising out of the ashes of the Boy Scouts,” Hoag says. 

The cookies came later, after Hoag and Kassler handed the reins to Kent Combo and Larry Caldwell in 1979; the booth evolved into the bakery fairgoers know today. 

“I left, and [Combo] migrated into a cookie booth because he was really a cookie baker,” Hoag says.

Now, nearly five decades later, Phoenix Rising’s amaretto shortbread and cookies remain one of the Fair’s most beloved treats. Built on four generations of crew members and a healthy dose of Boy Scouts-induced perseverance, the stand has earned its place as an OCF staple. 

Blazing Salads 

Tucked near the main stage along Sesame Street at booth 329, Blazing Salads is easy to find. Just look for the line. 

The queue snakes through the trees beneath a winged cantaloupe on a pole reading “Line Ends Here,” which gets passed further and further back as more hungry fairgoers arrive. For many, the wait is worth it. Blazing Salads is home to two OCF staples: The Avocado Dream Boat and the Forbidden Fruit Salad. 

The booth traces its roots back to 1979, when the Grim family sold ice cream served in half a cantaloupe. Inspired by the 1974 film Blazing Saddles, they named the operation Blazing Salads. The following year, when food booth locations were assigned with little more than a flag and the instructions to “run and claim your spot,” the Grim brothers sprinted to the farthest corner of the fairgrounds. Nearly five decades later, Blazing Salads remains in the same location. 

According to Jill Carter, one of the employee-owners of Blazing Salads and this year’s OCF poster artist, the booth’s success depends on a decades-long partnership with Dan Murray’s Santa Clara Farm Stand. 

“Every day, they’ll deliver our fresh produce,” Carter says. “The only reason why we’ve been able to be successful is that we have that collaboration, because otherwise, how are you ever gonna find 26 cases of ripe avocados in one weekend?”

Those avocados are destined for the Avocado Dream Boat, Blazing Salads’ signature dish. What began as a simple crew snack eventually became the booth’s most popular menu item. Filled with homemade hummus, fresh vegetables and a house-made Moroccan spice blend, the Dream Boat has earned a cult following among fairgoers.

Earth & Spirit Elixir Bar

Just as new to Fair this year as I am is the Earth and Spirit Elixir Bar, an alcohol-free, whimsical botanical beverage cart located in Xavanadu  near the dance pavilion. Reishi Strauss, owner of Earth and Spirit Botanicals, has been a fairgoer for many years, but this year she hopes to join the next generation of Fair with her elixir bar. 

“We are really passionate about maintaining and contributing to a healthy, earth-based, whimsical, family-friendly culture at the Fair,” Strauss says.

Designated to be both enchanting and interactive, the elixir bar features botanical drinks made with locally sourced organic ingredients to create “sober magic.” Four signature beverages will make their Fair debut. The Queen Bee combines peaches, ginger, turmeric and propolis harvested from Strauss’s own beehives. 

The Mate Mojito features yerba mate tea and mojito mint from Rhythm Seed Farm in Portland. Heart Nectar blends organic strawberries from Nottingham Farm, rose petals and blackberry honey from Botanical Artistry Farm in Eugene. 

Blueberry Fairy is a lavender-blueberry lemonade infused with butterfly pea flower extract. It offers a bit of botanical magic:

“Once we add the blue on top of the lemonade, as the customer mixes it, it turns this bright pink color from the butterfly pea pigment reacting with the acidity of the lemon,” Strauss says. “It’s really beautiful, and it’s interactive too, which is one of the main tenets of our booth. We want to create these fun, whimsical, magical, earthy interactions between ourselves, the drinks and our customers.”

Beyond serving colorful beverages, Strauss hopes the elixir bar offers an alternative vision of bar culture.

“We want to create a more wholesome, sober, earth-based culture that is founded and operated by women and helps create more beauty and safety around drink-based social spaces,” Strauss says. “We like encouraging people’s attention to go towards our local farms or local ecosystems or local flavors and creating a healthy bio-regional culture that’s based in the Earth.” 

While I barely scratched the surface of the Fair’s 57 years of lore, one thing is for sure: I will leave with a full stomach and a new understanding of what makes the Oregon Country Fair unlike any other. There are no turkey legs here, just Avocado Dream Boats, decades-old cookie recipes, and botanical elixirs made with magical botanical interactions. If that doesn’t scream Oregon Country Fair, then I don’t know what does. 

More information about the food vendors at Oregon Country Fair is available at OregonCountryFair.org/type/food-booths.