The Great Minnesota Get-Together

I got lucky, really lucky, that Labor Day came late this year because apparently the arrival of Labor Day controls the length of time that the Minnesota State Fair will be up and running. It just so happens that Labor Day came on September 7th, just in time to give every ounce of East Coast in my parents and I a good shaking.

The Minnesota State Fair is the second largest fair in the country, second only to TEXAS! And supposedly the only reason Texas ranks supreme is because their fair runs twice as long. This seemed a little absurd to me and so when I heard that we'd be moving in time for the fair I was both terrified and excited with what experiences may come.

First of all, the fair is enormous in every way possible. The crowds are enormous, the lines are enormous, the fair grounds are enormous, and the food is enormous (and deep fried, and on a stick.) I have only ever witnessed crowds to this calibur once in my life and it was in the middle of Broad Street, Philadelphia for the Phillies riots/celebrations when they won the World Series. See the resemblance?

Phillies Championship Parade

Phillies riots (photo credit: S. Wilson)

Minnesota State Fair crowds

And honestly, I am a little disturbed that a fair bares any resemblance to a World Championship parade at all. In any case, the masses of people are the least shocking of this adventure.

While the fair offers many fair-type things such as horticulture and baby animal displays (both of which are adorable in that small town way) it seems to me that the real reason Minnesotans flock to this week long fest is the food (or rather, for an excuse to binge on deep fried Snickers bars, jumbo bacon on a stick, buckets of cookies, and corn on the cob.)

Honestly, forget the rides, the attractions, and the concerts, at the Minnesota State Fair the name of the game is food! And not just food, but deep fried food, food on a stick, and food in sickening, fattening combinations that one can only dream about - I'm talking deep fried candy bars, potato spiral wrapped hot dogs, fried alligator with deep fried corn bread, and deep friend Coca Cola (and trust that these are not the most obscure menu items of the bunch!)

As a vegetarian, I stayed away from most of the food options - actually, as a self-respecting human being, I stayed away from most of the food options, but those things didn't seem to stop my fellow fair goers. Treats that I did indulge in however included the standard fair fanfare - cheese curds, french fries, and Sweet Martha's Cookies (is it a fair experience without these things?)

Sweet Martha's Cookies, for those of you who are out of the know, are a fair specialty. In fact, Sweet Martha only sells cookies at the fair (okay, okay, and in the local freezer isle too.) But the fact that this company can stand the test of time with a sale date of one week per year is pretty amazing. Believe me, people flock to one or both of the Sweet Martha's stands and wait in astounding lines for simple chocolate chip cookies. Don't get me wrong, they are delicious, but they are very basic to say the least.

What really draws people is the portioning of the cookies - there is no such thing as having one cookie. No, Sweet Martha's sells their baked goods in two sizes, big and bigger. The former comes in a cone shaped cup filled far past the amount it can hold and shoved into the patron's hands for happy eatings. The latter size comes in a bucket, seriously, a big plastic bucket that comes with a lid that can not be utilized until roughly twenty of these morsels are eaten. The bucket size, meant for sharing of course, has cookies literally falling out of it and so the siting of smashed up cookies all over the fair grounds are neither rare nor surprising.

We bought the bucket size because in all honesty, who can resist a bucket of cookies? However I think there are still some cookies left in our freezer that remain uneaten.

(more on cheese curds at a later date)

All in all, my State Fair experience was a success. I have no real qualms with the Midwest and their get-togethers, except that an attraction like this would never exist on the East Coast - I don't even think I've ever been to the Pennsylvania State fair, and if I have it is undoubtedly no where near the spectacle that is the Minnesota State Fair. But, such is Midwest life I suppose.