I was born and raised on the East Coast.  I went to college on the East Coast, and then medical school on the East Coast.  Then, my wife (then fiance) and I picked up and moved all the way out to the West Coast for 5 years.  It wasn’t until 2003 that I spent any real time in the Midwest.

It wasn’t until 2003 that I ever went to a state fair.

For people who don’t live in places like this, there is simply no way to explain the Indiana State Fair.  There is a whole thing with animals and showing them.  I don’t understand any of it.  Truly, I can’t tell the difference between the pig that wins first place and the one who goes home empty handed.  There are rides, but I don’t trust any of them.  There are shows, but I don’t really care for anyone performing there.  So why do we go?

The food.  It’s completely insane.

You can turn on Top Chef or any show on the Food Network and hear about chefs on the “cutting edge”.  They may be deconstructing old favorites, or using molecular gastronomy, or fusing two cuisines.  They have NOTHING on the artists at the state fair.

State fair food people do things that no one in the real world would dare.  They push the limits, to the point that I no longer know where this will end.

I warn you.  The rest of this post is not for the faint of heart.

My wife grew up in Milwaukee.  She will occasionally talk of food that she loved at their state fair when she was a child.  Because of this, we always manage to nab one of these (her favorites):

That is a chocolate cream puff. We once got one that I swear weighed 6 pounds.