You ever put together one of those bookcases you buy in box or piece of IKEA furniture? You know how the instructions sometimes do not seem to be in English? I can only wonder, when I have that experience, if the instruction writer was so used to the assembly process that forgetting a step or two was easy.
Overall, I am pretty impressed with the State of Oregon. In the almost two years I have lived here I have found most people are friendly and helpful.
I even have been impressed by DMV, which any American who drives knows is an agency that seems to be designed to stay just barely within the Geneva Convention guidelines for torture. In West Virginia, for example, it was pretty typical to wait an hour only to be told that I did not have the right information. Here, we were able to register a car that was 3000 miles away. Not only did they understand the situation, they even had a form and system in place. I definitely felt we were moving to a place where information was shared, and shared in a way that was easy to understand.
However, I hit a spot where the published information for my new business endeavor is not quite “full”. To become a state licensed processor I read I needed to call the Health Department person in charge of my county. I read that the kitchen needs to be inspected and I should call 2 weeks before I expect to start processing. I also read that the state does not prorate the $450 annual license which runs from July 1-June 30, so I figured I would wait until June 15 to call.
I also read that I need to have each recipe I plan to process reviewed by a state licensed lab for Ph, water activity and Brix. Then and only then do I need to send another sample and the written recipe to another lab, run by Oregon State University, for approval. They are the licensing agency, so their approval is tantamount. But no where, in anything I read, did it say that the lab test must be done before the Health Department is called and the license application begins.
So, the Health Department person responded to my phone call today and I need to do things in a different order than what I read. Okay, not a biggie…just a tad annoying. She will not give me a list of approved labs. Okay. I can find some on Google.
I need to convert my recipes into weight measurements in grams, not in cups or teaspoons. Okay.
She’ll be happy to meet with me. Great. 
I want to get rolling and this will take another few weeks. Okay. Once I am up and running I will be up and running so in the scheme of things, this is NOT a big deal. Just need to remember to breathe……
goingplaceslivinglife 
June 16, 2015 at 5:20 am
keep on keeping on…I see it’s not much different in Oregon – than it is in WV.
You don’t need FDA approval for your recipes to sell commercially? Good luck my friend 🙂
June 16, 2015 at 6:03 am
Yes, this latest conversation told me that but all the information she offered was that it does not cost anything. I will trod on……
June 15, 2015 at 7:30 pm
Better you than me. I have a low tolerance for this sort of thing. But I wish you loads of luck!!! 🙂
June 15, 2015 at 8:00 pm
It will happen….I remind myself that a week or two later is not really going to be horrible…that it will flow smoothly after this initial start-up phase.