What is a Scotch Egg?

What do the following foods have in common:  15" corn dog, pot stickers, spaghetti and meatball dinner, scotch eggs, s'mores, and pizza?  They're all foods you can buy on a stick at the Minnesota State Fair!

In 1854 the Minnesota Territory held a territory fair.  They've held the state fair annually since 1859 (one year after becoming a state.)  That means that the Minnesota State Fair is older than the state itself.  On Friday, Isaac skipped class and we spent the whole day there.  There were so many people.  This fair gets about 1.8 million visitors every year over the twelve days it's open.  That makes it the highest daily attendance of any fair in the country.  The Puyallup Fair, also one of the five biggest, gets 1.1 million visitors a year and is open for 17 days (in the fall).  This leads to a very crowded fairgrounds.

The crowds on one of the main streets in the fair

Kim with a deep fried Snickers

As with every fair, there were lots of interesting foods.  We couldn't try everything, but everything looked great!  They serve almost anything you can think of on a stick so you can keep walking around while you eat!  There was one place that sold buckets of fresh baked cookies.  We saw everyone walking around with them.  They would've been great to take to the all you can drink milk stand!  The common corn dog at the Minnesota fair is called the Pronto Pup.  And instead of giving you ketchup and mustard to dip it in, they ask what you want, and then just brush it on the dog before giving it to you.  We saw a booth that was selling scotch eggs on a stick, and we'd never heard of scotch eggs before.  A scotch egg is a hard boiled egg wrapped in sausage, battered, and deep fried.  We didn't try it at the fair, but we might try it at home sometime, because it looked so good!  The fair's deep fried candy bars are legend around here, so we had to try those.  We got a Snickers and Reese's.  They were both good.

They had a lot of shows to go see. There was a reptile show, and a butterfly room.  We went to a dog show, where the dogs did lots of cool tricks. They also had dog diving, which was really cool!  We also went to a lumberjack show.  The two teams competed against each other to complete tasks like sawing through a log the fastest.  It was really fun to watch!

Joslyn liked the piglets

Of course, there were tons of animals to see.  The very first barn we went to was the Miracle of Birth Center.  Inside were all the pregnant animals at the fair, and they had a bunch of newly born animals too! Joslyn got to pet a lamb that was 4 days old, a bunny that was 2 days old, and a piglet that was born that morning!  We also went into the regular animal barns and saw all the cows, sheep and pigs.  Joslyn's favorite was the sheep.  While at the fair she associated for the first time sheep with 'baaa'!

Joslyn petting a two day old bunny

Each week we're trying to share one fun adventure we went on and one delicious food or drink we made.  This week we had a dish called omu-rice ("omu" is short for omelet).  This is a meal that Isaac had in Japan.  He had never made it in Japan, or seen a recipe.  So, he just kind of made it up after he got back based on what he remembered.  It may not resemble the actual Japanese dish called omu-rice.

Might need more ketchup!

1. Fry up some chicken and vegetables.  Popular choices include carrots, onions, bell peppers, corn, and green onions.  Season with garlic, ginger, soy sauce, and brown sugar.
2. Add an egg and mix it up.
3. When the egg is mostly cooked but not completely done, add fully cooked rice.  Stir in some more garlic, and soy sauce.  Add some water and put a lid on the pan so it can steam cook a little.
4.  Mix up an egg or two in a bowl.  Try to fry the mixed egg as thin as possible.
5. Put the rice stuff on a plate in a mound shape.  Put the thin egg blanket on top.  Cover in ketchup and enjoy.

Kim and I like it a lot.  Joslyn just thinks it's ok.  Let us know if you try it out and what you think!  We'll post again next week!