Get to the State Fair!

Ah, the Indiana State Fair. It's really all about the food. It's a celebration of what our Hoosier soil, plants, animals, and hard working farmers give us every year. So come and eat heartily!

I took the above photo because this sight was the epitome of state fairs: abundance and indulgence. It's only once a year, so why not?!

This was the year of the pig and the winning food item for 2010 was the Garbage Burger. Yes, it does look like garbage, but it's pretty darn tasty. A Garbage Burger is a pork burger topped with BBQ pulled pork between a hamburger bun. Get to the Indiana Pork Farmer's tent to order one.

Hook's Drug Store is a must see. I love the artifacts and how well preserved the store is. There are so many fun facts to read about throughout the place. They have a working soda fountain with real phosphates and floats. They even have the old timey Green River soda.

Fried cheddar cheese. You can't go to the state fair without eating something that's been battered and plunged into boiling oil. It's just un-American. Every year, I swear to order a fried candy bar, but I always punk out. Some day, greasy candy bar, some day!

There is a giant cheese sculpture in working progress. It is pig and Colts themed. It's oddly shiny. Should cheese be shiny?

Taffy. It's really easy to eat in this stifling weather. At a temperature of 95 degrees, taffy becomes significantly less taxing on dental caps and fillings.

I finished this regional gastronomic tradition with honey ice cream, which is surprisingly frothy, but perhaps it's the heat again. I hope you don't let the weather detour you from attending your state fair.

Come for the pineapple whip ice cream and a Garbage Burger. Stock up on Indiana maple syrup and local honey products like soap and other beauty products. Any way you look at it, there's a little something for everyone at the state fair.

Good Ol' Corn Bread

Every year, my family and I go to the Indiana State Fair. We go to get the essentials: a funnel cake, pineapple whip ice cream, sugar coated German almonds, Indiana maple syrup, etc. When I'm there, I have to purchase some sort of flour from Sunny Slopes Farm. Last year I got some wheat bran, and this year freshly milled corn meal came home with me. I've had this corn bread recipe for over two years. It's one of a handful of recipes that Sunny Slopes Farm gives out every year. Today was the perfect time to whip some up from scratch.

I sampled and bought this Indiana sorghum to put into my real, old timey corn bread.

These are my eggs of choice. I get them at the Binford Farmers Market on Saturdays when I'm there with my load of cookies. Jonathan and Lucinda are good people.
The recipe says to turn the oven on to 400 degrees and put butter (it calls for shortening, but I don't believe in that junk.) in the cast iron skillet to melt while you get the other ingredients together. This doesn't mean dilly dally around - AKA taking photos for a blog - because when I pulled the pan out of the oven, I had some BLACK butter. It was not pretty. I had to do a dump and clean, then melt some more. Boo hiss, wasted precious butter. In went the sorghum molasses. I had never made corn bread with this traditional ingredient. I don't prefer it. Honey is my sweetener of choice.

I didn't like the assembly of ingredients on the recipe. Normally when you make corn bread, you would mix the dry ingredients together, then mix the wet ingredients, then add the dry to the wet. This would be my suggestion for you.

This was difficult to shoot. The skillet was dang HEAVY and a HOT. I burnt the palm of my hand during this stunt. The things I do for show business.

Returning it all to the piping hot skillet. Doesn't look appetizing, bare with me.

After about 17 minutes, it was all done. It had to wait a few hours until dinner time. Then came the slicing and honey drizzling.

That's how I like it. Warm and slathered with honey. Some prefer butter and some even molasses. However you take it, enjoy a chunk of corn bread soon.