Day 5 - Oregon - The Pacific Hazelnut Candy Factory

When we planned our trip to Oregon, I'd asked both Bert and TC to choose a place or two they'd want to visit...

TC's choice was a candy factory...

So that is what I looked into and found that there was a candy factory just twenty minutes south of PDX...

Did you know that the Hazelnut is the State Nut of Oregon?

Well, hazelnuts are our friend here at the Pacific Hazelnut Candy Factory, a small unassuming building located near the small airport in Aurora (when I hear Aurora, I think of Aurora, Illinois from Wayne's World).

I'd read online that tours were available...

It must have been outdated because when we got there, it didn't really look like a place that did tours. When you walk in, you first encounter the gift shop. There are also free samples of chocolate covered hazelnuts and hazelnuts in all kinds of flavors (garlic, bbq, ranch, etc).

These were so good, the chocolate covered fruits (cherries, blueberries, strawberries). My favorite were the super dark chocolate covered hazelnuts (80% dark).

One of the workers came in to greet us and he told us there weren't any tours, but he must have changed his mind because he said, "Well, since there's no one else here and it's slow...why not!"

He led us through the doors and we were in the backrooms of the factory. Here are copper kettles used in melting chocolates for their confections. Since Easter was only one week away, they had "shells" of the Easter eggs ready for decorating. Turns out that there is one man there who decorates each egg by hand. We were going to meet him in a few minutes.

I know it doesn't look glamorous or anything, but we were amazed that the worker, Mr. Jorge Abrigo (a native of Michoacan, Mexico) was nice enough to give us a behind the scenes look.

Here he is explaining how they melt the chocolates and sometimes flavor the chocolate for their chocolate covered fruit candies.

The green stuff you see are icing letter and fanciful curlicues waiting to be placed on Easter eggs. Those rolling pin things on the wall were some sort of cutter for the caramels.

Here are a few trays of caramels waiting to be cut and covered in chocolate and sea salt.

I believe this was a roasting contraption...

Boxes of hazelnuts...

Hazelnuts in bins...

Hazelnuts are placed in the cylindrical contraption and the rotating motion removes the skins.

Here were some chocolate covered fruit flavored chocolates. Jorge gave us a few to sample. He said this was their newest product, the mango flavored chocolates.

These were rotating drums that mixed the candy coating over the candy pieces...

The chocolate they use is Guittard (I saw the label in one of the store rooms; the door was open).

An inventory list of their products...

These were more of those fruity chocolates and some Easter candies.



Above is the man who decorates the Easter candies by hand and is also the one who does the handmade chocolate covered caramels with sea salt. This was a fresh batch and he offered us each a piece. The caramel itself was a deeper color of caramel than what I was used to but the flavor was so much better. These weren't "Kraft" caramel-quality. The chocolate coating was nice and thick and the sea salt sprinkles were noticeable as well. The man told us he used to work a nine to five job then decided to quite several years ago to pursue his passion with candy making. He used to make home made candies as gifts to his friends but his family persuaded him to make candy full time.

Both men were super cool and nice about letting us see what goes on at the factory. Unfortunately none of the machines with conveyor belts were on, so we couldn't see how the toffees and other candies are enrobed in chocolate and cooled. But still, this was a welcome surprise and we were happy to know more about the candy making process and meeting these nice folks. Of course, we stopped by the gift shop on the way out to stock up on gifts for family, friends, and ourselves.

Pacific Hazelnut Candy Factory
14673 Ottaway Ave NE
Aurora, OR 97002
(503) 678-2755

www.pacifichazelnut.com

It was time to head back up to PDX and try out another food pod!