The Monroe County Fair is in full swing, and the air is rich with the smell of deep-fried Oreos, pork tenderloin sandwiches and sweet lemon shake-ups.
Fair food is an iconic part of just about any county fair experience, but certain hallmarks, like corn dogs, kettle corn and elephant ears tend to get more love than others. We set out on a mission to find the weirdest, sweetest and most delectable foods we could find, and came back with several foods we'd never even heard of before. From pickle popsicles to elk-meat burgers, the foods we found were a little unconventional, but tasty nevertheless .
Here are Brian and Marissa's five favorite foods at the Monroe County Fair:
Best sandwich: Elk burger
Location: Shucker Shak
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Price: $9 (cash only)
If you’ve never had elk before (we certainly hadn’t), you’ll have your chance at the Monroe County Fair. Bloomington-based food truck Shucker Shak offers their signature elk burger for $9, topped with romaine lettuce, onions, slices of tomato and melty American cheese. The elk itself is soft and almost semisweet, with a taste that’s close to beef and a texture that's a bit like meatloaf. At $9, it’s fairly priced fair fare – plus, you’ll get to say you’ve tried elk for the rest of your life.
Our conversation:
Brian: It tastes kind of weird, but it also tastes kind of normal. It’s the kind of thing where if I got it at a cafeteria, and it was presented as a normal burger, I probably wouldn’t even flinch.
Marissa: Yeah. I was almost expecting the meat to be tougher, like the idea of an elk burger made me think of deer jerky. This really just tastes like a regular burger, so if pork tenderloin isn’t your thing and you just want a classic burger, this is a pretty good option.
Brian: Yeah, “elk” had me imagining something a lot bulkier, but it’s a pretty light eat. So if you’re at the fair and want a decent portion, but maybe not something as heavy as a classic, greasy burger, this is a good in-between.
Weirdest food: Pickle popsicle
Location: 4-H Food Booth (next to grandstand)
Price: $1
We walked up and down the fairgrounds, twice, to find the most eye-catching food possible, and none caught our eye quite like the pickle popsicle at the 4-H food booth right in front of the grandstand. There were some other options for “ice cold pickles” across the grounds, so going in, we were half-expecting to be handed a frozen pickle spear on a stick. What we got instead was a neon-green pickle-juice popsicle with two quartered spears of pickle frozen at the top. There’s not much to say for the flavor here; it is just frozen pickle juice, so its agreeability depends on how pickle-friendly your taste buds are. But at just $1, we found it to be a fun and coolly refreshing (albeit salty) palate cleanser between meals.
Our conversation:
Brian: I wonder if we’re the first people today to order this.
Marissa: Probably!
Brian: Maybe the first people in history – I wonder if they were in the back like, “Guys, someone actually ordered one.”
Marissa: I love the dynamic of like, once you get to the actual piece of pickle on it, you have to start chewing. So it’s a little unsettling, but it definitely adds to the experience.
Brian: And it’s quite the experience. Probably the most interesting fair food I’ve had.
Marissa: I will say, I’m not a big pickle person, but it’s pretty light and refreshing, compared to like a deep-fried Oreo.
Brian: That’s true. It’s a good break from the fried food. Kind of a nice way to cool down.
Best dessert: Ice cream nachos
Location: Sugar Shack
Price: $7
Choosing a sweet food is possibly the toughest part of a day at the fair. We passed fried dough covered in powdered sugar, pecan-crusted, gooey cinnamon rolls and fair classics like cotton candy. Ultimately, we have to recommend the ice cream nachos from Sugar Shack, which offer something both familiar and fresh for only $7. We went with vanilla, although the shack also offers chocolate, and added Oreo and M&Ms as toppings, which are an extra dollar. If you don’t spend the extra money, you’ll still get plenty of toppings, including chocolate syrup, whipped cream and sprinkles. The best part of this dish are the circular, waffle-cone chips that you can dip in the ice cream.
Our conversation:
Brian: I think vanilla is the way to go. Especially if you're gonna get it loaded with all the toppings. Like chocolate would feel like a little too much.
Marissa: It's a classic part of ice cream to eat the cone as you go, but it's always been kind of precarious because you're eating the cone and you're actively destroying the structure that holds the ice cream. So this is kind of an innovative way to get that same flavor combination and texture combination.
Brian: Yeah, you can eat the waffle and the ice cream without worrying about it crumbling and melting in your face. You know what you're getting into. Honestly, really good food. I'm surprised I haven't seen this before. This should be at every ice cream truck in America.
Best fried potatoes: Dump Fries
Location: Pappy Shack
Price: $10
No fair day is complete without some form of fried potatoes. After surveying the options, we opted for PappyShack’s Dump Fries for $10. Despite the name, these fries were a treasure – thick, lightly spiced waffle fries doused in bacon, cheese, sour cream, jalapeños and a fry sauce that was both sweet and spicy. The waffle fry and sauce combo was reminiscent of Chick-fil-A, but the extra toppings made it a fair food classic. Our only complaint was there weren't enough jalapeño slices.
Our conversation:
Brian: I think it's really good. I really, really think the sauce is like the best part of it. It is like a little on the sweet side and I really liked the jalapenos but there weren't that many of them. So I think maybe more jalapenos or maybe diced jalapenos so it can kind of get in all the groups would be good.
Marissa: I agree that it needs more jalapenos for sure. It is pretty messy. So that might be a factor if you don't want to get random sauce all over your shirt.
Brian: Yeah, we sat down to do it. It might be hard to be walking and eating this.
Marissa: This is not a walk and talk.
Best "healthy" food: Deep-fried veggies
Location: Stand with a poster labeled “Deep-fried veggies”
Price: $12
After the Dump Fries, we were craving something with more nutrients. We set out to do the impossible and find something healthy. They definitely aren’t selling fresh fruit or salads at the fair, so we lowered our expectations and kept an open mind. Eventually, we found a stand with a promising poster showing cartoon vegetables smiling and holding hands. Of course, the veggies were deep-fried, but it had to be the healthiest of everything going into the fryer at the fair that day. For $12, this order consists of broccoli, cauliflower, mushrooms, onions and zucchini slices, all encased in golden-brown batter.
Our conversation:
Brian: If you had to rank them, what do you think?
Marissa: Probably mushroom, zucchini, cauliflower, broccoli…and an onion ring is an onion ring.
Brian: Interesting. I would say onion ring: old reliable. Then cauliflower, mushroom, broccoli, zucchini. I don't like the zucchini because it's too thin. Like I want to be able to bite into the zucchini.
Marissa: Zucchini as the worst?!
Brian: I don't know, I'm a big zucchini fan, and I'm a big fried zucchini fan. I think it's just this style of like, paper thin zucchini.
Marissa: I just feel like, ultimately, this is the thing that probably should never have been created. And the fact that we live in a world where it exists is probably a bad thing for the human race maybe.
Brian: I don't know if it's a good option for anyone. I think it's a good option if you want to feel like you're eating vegetables at the fair, but it also definitely wears you down. It's really good fry batter, whatever they did. Very light and crispy and airy.
Reach Brian Rosenzweig at brian@heraldt.com and Marissa Meador at mmeador@gannett.com.
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