The next time you’re in need of a quality, chef-prepared meal or event spread fit for a king, you might want to look no further than King’s Farm to Table, delicious new addition to the Holly Mall in downtown Canby that officially opens Friday, Oct. 8.
King’s Farm to Table, which started as a micro-farm and farm stand located on Stafford Road in Wilsonville, has reinvented itself in its new digs as a high-end specialty market and scratch deli offering chef-prepared, locally sourced and inventive foods — with a little something for everyone.
“What I really hope that we’re able to do is that we’re all things to all people,” explains head chef Bill King, who owns the store with his wife, Jennifer. “I want to span the broad demographic of the folks who live in Canby.
“We want to do a lot of the down-home, comfort food, but then on the flip side, have some things that a little fancier, pretty interesting and more sophisticated.”
King says the deli will offer a wide variety of prepared foods, from familiar staples like meatloaf, fried chicken, potato salad and macaroni and cheese, to more adventurous and exotic dishes like pork loin with apricot glaze, edamame salad with mint and roast chicken with a basil-chili vinaigrette.
“Really bouncing across the spectrum between your more traditional foods and a more contemporary and creative approach,” King sums up.
A big focus at the new storefront will be King’s famous, handcrafted barbecue, which samples the best regional techniques from across the United States.
“Every day, we’ll have Texas brisket, western Carolina-style pulled pork and Tennessee baby back ribs,” King says. “We’ll also be doing barbecue chicken with a rotating variety of seasonal fruit barbecue sauces and flavors.”
In addition to King’s chef-prepared dishes, sides and entrees, King’s Farm to Table will offer a wide variety of locally sourced, high-quality products and grocery items, including craft jams, jellies and applesauce, gourmet meat sticks, hot sauce, pickles, canned produce, potato chips and other snacks, syrup, dried fruit and other condiments.
“We try to keep most everything local,” King says. “We’re about 85 to 90% local. So that’s kind of the first thing we need to check off. And then, it’s just really about quality. I mean, if I taste something and it’s delicious, then I want it in the store. I think that’s the simplest way to put it.”
King’s Farm to Table partnered with more than a dozen local farms and producers when it was a farm stand on Stafford Road, and King says that will continue with the move to town.
“I kind of view this as country store meets urban market,” King says. “We wanted to have a little bit of a country vibe here.”
King, a legend in the hospitality industry, practically grew up in food service and has been part of the culinary community in the rural Willamette Valley area south of Portland for more than 40 years: since 1980, when he came on as executive chef at the Aurora Colony Inn.
His career as a professional chef actually started one stop earlier than that, when he was made executive chef of Pearl Street Station in Eugene at age 24. He soon moved to Portland, where he owned and operated Savoir Faire, a French cafe and charcuterie that was rated at the top of the city’s casual dining scene throughout the early 1980s.
In 1985, King joined McCormick & Schmick’s Restaurant Group, when it was a much smaller collective of five or six establishments. He was named executive chef of the original McCormick & Schmick’s Seafood Restaurant in downtown Portland the following year.
He advanced as the company grew into a national and even global brand, one that was publicly traded on the New York Stock Exchange and boasted more than 100 locations across the country.
King was eventually named vice president of culinary development and training, which entailed culinary research and development (um, can I add that to my job description, please?), corporate purchasing, facility design and the development and opening of new restaurant locations.
King has been a frequent guest on local television and radio programs in Portland over the years and has authored two McCormick & Schmick’s seafood cookbooks as well as two independent books with partner and photographer Rick Shafer.
He was named Oregon Seafood Chef of the Year in 1987 and was a semifinalist in the national contest that year. He is also a three-time gold and three-time silver medal winner from the American Culinary Federation.
King’s Farm to Table offers a wide array of chef-prepared foods to go, along with a well-stocked marketplace of excellent foodstuffs. It does not offer dine-in service. It is located at the Holly Mall at 241 NW 2nd Ave. and open from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Wednesday through Sunday. For updates, visit their Facebook page.
