“Our state fair is a great state fair…”
Okay, the bulleted list of today’s highlights of my annual visit to the Minnesota State Fair:
- Seeing a calf be born — Walking in to the fair, we saw a new building — the Miracle of Birth Center. Upon approaching the building, we noticed it was packed with people. As it turns out, we arrived just in time to see a cow give birth, with placenta and everything. However, they are not yet at the point of serving placenta as a fair food. (I would try it though — seriously.)
- Princess Kay in butter — One of the Princess Kay of the Milky Way candidates was having her head sculpted into butter, as is tradition, in a chilled room in the Empire Commons. She mentioned that both of her older sisters had been dairy princesses, and thus this will be the third butter head in her parents freezer. These are 90 pound blocks of butter. I suspect they must have a separate freezer just for the butter heads.
- The food — Many glasses of milk, a scotch egg (hard boiled egg surrounded by sausage), deep fried macaroni and cheese on a stick, a chocolate ice cream cone, a lingonberry ice cream float, fried cheese curds, ginger beer, chocolate covered cheesecake on a stick, and probably more that I’m forgetting. I think I will eat salads for the rest of the week.
- Flying over the fair — Rode on both of the gondola rides — the original Sky Ride that takes you from Heritage Square to the Agriculture Building and the much newer Sky Glider, which takes you from the north end of the fair (near the Twins booth) to the Grandstand.
- The Barbary Coast Dixieland Show Band — These guys were great. Clarinets, trombones, trumpets, a banjo, an upright bass, and drumset — and most of them rotated around a few of these. The highlight for me was the Washington and Lee Swing, a swing version of my high school rouser.
- The animals — Not just the newborn calf, but pigs, sheep, cows, chickens, ducks, geese, and even a few horses (though the main horse barn was closed today).
I love the fair.
Colossus of Rhode 
The first time I heard a commercial for the new Miracle of Birth Center at the state fair, I thought, “The prolife people have actually taken a stand at the state fair?! Now thats just taking it too far.” I was so confused as to what it was because the commercial for it didn’t explain it at all.
Since I met the family at the fair, I didn’t see and partake quite as much as the rest. However, I did have my eye out for the “hotdish on a stick” which unfortunately was never found. It turns out that it was somewhere near the horse barn; which since it wasn’t open that day explains why y’all missed the newest fair delicacy.
Also, it may have only been me, but I thought you grabbed one of the hot spam on bread samples as we left the fair; thus making Minnesota’s own Spam your last tidbit of the fair.
Our state fair is truly a great state fair. why even the greatest in “all” the states.
I was reading your comments, and realized that I am the girl that you saw getting her head carved in butter. And yes, my parents still have all 3 heads in the freezer, we can’t hold a lot in there besides that and I doubt that my mom will ever get rid of them. Anyways, I just thought that I would update you on the strange tradition of butterheads at the state fair!