Jory A Perfect 10 - A Chill Travelers Birthday

A Chill Travelers birthday celebration is always an event oriented occasion. When you travel as much as we do when birthdays roll around they are not about presents, cakes and funny hats. They are all inclusive experiences.

This year when Wendy’s birthday was in planning range, we talked about a few days at the world famous Allison Inn & Spa in Newberg Oregon. We called in hopes of getting a room for a couple of nights. Score! Then we thought we had better make reservations at Jory for dinner the two nights we would be there. Score, they had room for us. This is a hint that getting into Allison is tough and Jory is sometimes tougher.

This is a review of Jory, but Jory’s Chill Travelers 10 rating comes partially from the Allison Inn and Spa. This place is as if you scooped up a modern Swiss resort and plopped it in the middle of Oregon Wine Country. The ambiance will whisk you off to Scandinavia or Switzerland with a fully attentive staff beginning with the car park valet’s. We arrive early after dropping off the furry kids at their own local reports and spas. Our room was not quite ready, so we walked around and toured the spa. Wendy had already schedule a massage, but after seeing the spa, we both filled our next day with all sorts of treatments and relaxation. The indoor pool and spa were also waiting for us and extremely inviting.

Chill Travelers have a philosophy that a birthday should be celebrated for more than just a day. We might have stayed a week if there was room and we could have eaten three meals a day at Jory Restaurant if they had room at the Inn. We only had two days, so we were mentally Jory centric.

Jory Restaurant A Perfect 10!

Chill Travelers Rating: [usr 10]

Jory Gets our highest rating ever on both the Chill Travelers scale and Zamato. A perfect score and if we could award extra points we would. This is not an easy score to attain and as world travelers, Bob & Wendy are not easily swayed to dole out such a rating.

Our first night at Jory was a pre-birthday celebration or like we say it, a practice for the real event. Pre-running Jory the night before the big day was amazing.

Imagine walking into a modern facility that resembles a billionaires home more than an Inn. Walking past a glass and modern bar area that overlooks the wine country valley, you walk into Jory with a feeling that Frank Lloyd Wright had risen from the dead to design it. The restaurant has indoor and terrace dining, but we chose the chef’s bar dining so that we could watch and interact with the chefs and sneak a peak at what we might want the next evening.

We are light eaters and really appreciated the portion sizes. The appetizer-starters were exotic with a combination of deep flavors, texture. We usually share our meals, not to be thrifty. We like to savor what we eat and our small appetite favors sharing. So, we started with the Pacific Oyster Tasting with two types of raw oysters in a pickled citrus-pink peppercorn mignonette. We each had a salad second course which was mixed greens from their garden, dried cherries, red onions, roasted filberts, pecorino, muscatel vinaigrette. We were hungry and broke from tradition to have separate main course dinners. Wendy had pan seared scallops and Bob the Pan-Seared Muscovy Duck with ivory lentil salad, fried okra, duck bacon, preserved meyer lemon. As a surprise, the staff created a pre-birthday desert for Wendy.

This dinner was both enjoyable and entertaining. We were able to meet the Exec Chef, Sunny, Andrew and Travis. They were informative and very attentive to our questions. Watching them work was like watching a well choreographed ballet. We walked through what they call their living room back to our room. Even though the Inn was full, it was so very social and quiet. Just like you would imagine a billionaire home.

Happy Birthday Wendy!

The next day started with a quick breakfast at Jory and off to the spa. The spa people even invited us to order lunch from Jory to be delivered in the spa. After a full day at the spa, we were relaxed and full of anticipation about the actual birthday dinner at Jory. Back in our room, we received a call for Jory telling us that the chef’s bar dining was filling up, so we hurried down. It was all a con as friends from LA, Mary and David, had ordered a special bottle of Pinot for Wendy and it was waiting along with birthday greetings form all the staff and the chefs.

We decided that this would be one of our split evening and we told our server that we would like to split everything. They were happy to oblige us and each plate that we received was perfectly split into two with full presentation. For us the portions were perfect.

So, we started with Pinot-Braised Pork Cheek with risotto, local sweet corn, romano beans, garden pepper reduction and Honeycrisp Apple Salad with horseradish cream, wheat berries, apple butter, caraway, marble rye crisp, watercress. Each course was separated with a delightful sorbet made at Jory. The night before we spotted the Wagyo New York steak being daringly prepared by Travis, so that had to be the main course for us. It was serve with abalone mushroom and lightly grilled new potatoes with a reduction sauce that we would have wanted a gallon to take home.

It is not polite to lick your dish in a public place, but I can assure you that you will be tempted at Jory.

At the end, we were full, but again without prompting the staff had prepared a birthday wish for Wendy that we had with the last drops of wine from Mary and David.

What a two day birthday adventure for Wendy. The highlight certainly has to be our two perfect 10 dinners at Jory.

Wendy is already planning a repeat visit next year for her birthday. That’s saying something for a person who seeks new adventures for her birthday.

So thanks to Jory’s Ms. Azi (Assistant Restaurant Manager), Sunny Jin (Jory Exec Chef) and both Andrew and Travis as well as our wait staff for making Wendy’s birthday a perfect 10!

Advise from Chill Travelers: You Get What You Give!

Jory is no different from any restaurant. We always watch people enjoying a place or not. The people we met eating at Jory and he staff all were happy to be there. This is not always true. So, it is important to realize that if you as a patron of any restaurant go there to have a good time, you probably will. If you go with unrealistic expectations you will most likely get what you give. Think about it.