They usually had it roasting in a pan of shallow water, so…both. The paper out of the water would char, but the lower paper wouldn’t.
The smell of the garlic wouldn’t come off your hands for days.
Fried dough, the ultimate fair food.
Since RenFaires are included, it’s sausage on a stick, hands down.
Corn Dogs and Candied Apples! Woot!
Years ago, the Santa Lucia Society did a street festival every year. It really was like the festival going on while Vito Corleone was stalking Don Fanucci from the rooftops.
The food there was made by the people of the neighborhood. The home made sausage and pepper sandwiches were wonderful, and the little old lady that made cannoli and sold them warm, and the gelato stand…
Nothing like fair and festival food in Little Italy
Once they moved Santa Lucia out of the neighborhood and to the down town area, it became just another carnival with the same old corn dogs and funnel cakes.
Cool!
First person I thought of when I read the thread title, and looked right away to see if he posted here. I’ve wondered what was so good about them, and would like to try one too!
mrAru is from Fresno, home of the California State Fair, his favorites are from the Ca State Faire, and New England’s Big E:
artichokes, date shakes, strawberry crepes, Michael the Cookie Jester’s cookies, funnel cakes, the tempura veggies, apple fritters, the Maine baked potatoes and some sort of shishkebabs.
Mine from NY State Faire [Owego, Oswego, Otsego and Troy!] and the Big E are:
funnel cake [I am seeing a trend here] tempura veggies, the shishkebab, apple fritters and the baked potato.
We do the Big E 1 day and that is one of my screw the diabetes eat everything days … followed by a couple days of serious indigestion and a whole burp I can’t believe I ate the whole thing misery. [The other day being our mutual birthday lobster gorge at Custys.]
I think funnel cake is the human version of the sweet scritchy spot on cats and dogs =)
Sweet: funnel cake. My world was seriously rocked the first time I had this. And watching it get made was pretty cool too. Cotton candy is pretty cool too.
Salty:spiral fries! Also fun to watch being made,with what looks like a shop tool, and they are the perfect shape for holding ketchup.
Drink: I guess Mead. I wasn’t too fond of the Guinness.
Also, generally, at certain festivals, it’s just a lot of fun when there’s a lot of international, healthy/organic/veggie, or otherwise alternative booths of food I don’t usually get to try.
Echoing that funnel cake and fried dough are different. Funnel cake batter is, more or less, waffle batter. (Pancake batter + an extra egg.)
So favorite? Funnel cake. Or frozen cheesecake on a stick, though I don’t like it coated in chocolate.
This is going to sound odd, but there’s a local fair where you can get the best damn fried baloney sandwich in the world. I know you’re thinking “Fried baloney? Really? That’s the best you can come up with?” but I swear you have to try one on these things to believe it.
And one more vote for funnel cake.
I don’t doubt it; I’ve had some damn good fried baloney.
Never seen fried baloney at a fair, it ws something we made at home though. Lately I get my cooked deli meat fix by splitting an inch thick slab of mortadella grilled or done in a foreman grill with mrAru and AruRoomie and the dog and cat. The fat goes all scoochy and crispy…
I…Dr. Lecter, is that you?
It’s been years since I’ve gone to a fair, but I have very fond memories of funnel cake and cotton candy. Both of these items really need to be made only moments before they’re consumed.
Corn dogs are sold at Sonic drive ins, and are also available frozen. Stay away from the dogs that are all or part turkey, though, only get the all beef dogs if you decide that you want to keep frozen dogs.
Turkey drumsticks, no matter how they’re prepared, will have long bone splinters in them. That’s just how turkeys grow. I’ve always considered a turkey drumstick to be much too big for one person.
Are y’all aware that you can roast garlic in your oven? Just slice off the top, drizzle with olive oil, cover with foil, and roast whenever you’re roasting something else. How to Roast Garlic, Roasted Garlic http://whatscookingamerica.net/rstgarlic.htm . You can also buy fancy schmancy garlic roasters, if you want, but I’ve never seen a need for them.
Where’s the fun in that? 
Fair food tastes good partially because you are at a fair. A corn dog at home is disgusting - but noshing on one while walking down the midway is a treat.
Two before me have mentioned cotton candy. That and caramel apples for me. You must take into account that I learned all I know about funnel cake from this thread, and it has to be 30 years (easy) since I was at a fair of any description where they had specialty foods or treats.
However, the smells of a fairground or midway are among the treasured memories from my early years, on up through high school for sure.
Oh, as for things you can actually get around here-- Every year at our annual arts festival, there’s a booth selling Tater Pigs. You take a potato, core a hole in it, stuff a sausage in the hole, and bake it, then top it with all of the standard “loaded baked potato” toppings. Plus, the booth is run as a fundraiser by a barbershop choir, so every so often while they’re serving up your tater pig, they’ll burst out in song.
The Sweet Pea festival just isn’t the same without a Tater Pig.
Wow, I’d seriously consider moving to Montana just for an annual Tater Pig – those sound incredible. A barbershop choir would just be icing on the cake! Er, sauce for the goose. Er… you catch my drift.
The trifecta of fried dough: funnel cakes, Tom Thumb donuts and beaver tails. Honourable mention goes to an old-style spudnut from the Spudnut Hut.
I always get a corn dog (I refuse to call them “pogos”), and I’m always underwhelmed.