Minnesota State Fair Fun
Today, we’re taking a little detour – and sharing all the fun things about the Great Minnesota Get-Together: the State Fair! It started Thursday, August 22, and runs through Labor Day, Monday, September 2, 2024.
New Foods
Let’s be honest – it’s (often) all about the food! There are 39 official new foods for 2024, including six new vendors. Here’s a peek at a few temptations for you:
- Ba’bacon Sour Cream + Onion: This feature contains sour cream + onion hummus topped with beef bacon, sumac tater tots, caramelized onions, scallions, French onion creme fraiche, black cumin seeds and chive oil. You’ll find it comees with pita puffs dusted with sour cream + onion powder. (Gluten-Free without pita puffs, Vegetarian without bacon) Sensitivity to light, noise, and/or smells
- Cookie Butter Crunch Mini Donuts: Get ready for vanilla-flavored mini donuts coated with vanilla sugar, and a topping of Biscoff® cookie butter drizzle and cookie crumbles. It comes in a bucket rimmed with cookie butter and cookie crumbles.
- Deep-Fried Ranch Dressing: Yes! It’s a thing. . . It’s time to try Ranch dressing filling made with ranch seasoning, buttermilk and cream cheese in a panko shell, deep-fried and has a ranch powder dusting. Served with a side of hot honey sauce crafted with Cry Baby Craig’s hot sauce. (Vegetarian)
- Grilled Purple Sticky Rice: Let’s turn our attention to purple sticky rice, grilled over an open flame until crunchy, then topped with choice of shredded Hmong beef jerky or pickled mushrooms. This feature has a garnish of fresh herbs and finished with Union Hmong Kitchen’s Krunchy Chili Aioli. (Gluten-Free, Vegetarian option)
- A new vendor offers the Nixtamal & Wild Rice Bowl, and you can choose Wóžapi & Bison Meatballs or Sweet Potato Dumplings. Take it a step further and add cricket & seed mix. All items are gluten-free. (Aug. 28 to Sept. 2 only)
- You can find the rest here 😊
Did You Know
What began in 1854 as a territorial fair to highlight agriculture and encourage farming in the region became the Minnesota State Fair in 1859, a year after Minnesota was granted statehood.
During the fair’s early years, the site of the exposition changed annually with stops in Minneapolis, St. Paul, Rochester, Red Wing, Winona and Owatonna. In the 1870s and early 1880s, civic groups from both St. Paul and Minneapolis worked relentlessly to provide a permanent home for the fair in their respective cities. The State Fair found a permanent home at its present location when Ramsey County donated its 210-acre poor farm to the state for exclusive use by the Agricultural Society, the governing body of the State Fair.
Was the Fair Ever Cancelled
Since its inception, the fair is held every year, with only six exceptions:
- 1861 and 1862 due to the Civil War and U.S.-Dakota War
- 1893 because of scheduling conflicts with the World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago,
- 1945 due to federal government travel restrictions during World War II,
- 1946 due to a polio epidemic
- 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
You can research more of the historical details here.
Keeping Up with Technology
This year there is a MN State Fair app! It offers interactive finders and searchable daily schedules. You can create a list of “Favorites” to review later! An integrated Food Finder and Shopping Finder are searchable by vendor names, menu items and map area. As the fair’s website states: Once you’ve made your way onto the fairgrounds, you’ll be able to find fair favorites closest to you in real time! You can read more here.
There is so much more to explore, from music to events to princesses with live carvings of their likenesses in butter (hey, that’s tradition!), and you can visit the Fair’s main page for more information!