I find it more than a bit ironic that the foods most of us associate with going to the State Fair are fried, processed and just plain bad for you. The fair is supposed to be a celebration of farming and farm life (I love visiting all the animals from 4H competitions). 
I would think the food at fairs would feature fresh produce rather than deep fried food served on sticks. Last year, the Minnesota State Fair featured 54 different food items conveniently served on sticks, and it seems our desire for deep fried food runs deep as soon as our feet hit the fairground.
Here is a list of fare to avoid when you go to the fair. Keeping these items out of your belly might just keep you from belly aching after riding the Tilt-a-Whirl or the Zipper.
- Fried Snickers (5 oz.): 444 calories and 29 grams (g) fat
- Fried Twinkie (2 oz.): 420 calories/34 g fat
- Funnel cake (1): 760 calories/44 g fat
- Twinkie Dog Sundae: 500 calories/14 g fat
- Cotton candy: 171 calories/0 fat
- Fried cheesecake (6 oz.): 655 calories/47 g fat
- Foot-long hot dog and bun: 470 calories/26 g fat
- Giant turkey leg: 1,136 calories/54 g fat
Let me just remind you that deep fried Twinkies are as bad for you as they sound.
Tell me, what is the most outrageous food you have eaten at a fair? I am curious so let me know in the comments section below.
Thomas Pink
I worked at a state fair one year and our exhibit was all about eating right (low sugar, portion sizes, etc.). We handed out maps of the fairgrounds to people with the routes they needed to walk to burn off the food they ate. The fried snickers bar took 5 miles, while the turkey leg is 11 miles!
1Yuck, yuck and more yuck. I saw this article on Webmd last week and thought it was disgusting some of the foods listed. Though I do like that cotton candy is only 170 calories... although it's pure sugar, something about it makes me feel like a kid again.
2Just like I have always said...anything deep fried is yummy. Curses!!!!
3I'm sorry I have to have a little funnel cake when I go to fairs. It's just my weakness, I split it with three other friends and enjoy. So in the end it's a 200 calorie snack and we send the rest of the days getting dizzy on rides.
4At the Del Mar Fair in California, they have a deep fried chicken sandwich with Krispy Kreme buns! They also have deep-fried cola..whatever that is. I'm assuming it's the syrup used in soda that's just fried. Heart-attack on a plate!
5i LOVE nutrition and eating healthy - but i always wanted to try a fried twinkie. i did. it was awesome! i say go for it once in your life. the flavors and texture was unbelievable. but, i said try it once. because the diarhea and stomach cramps that will follow will remind you to stay away
I'm having flashbacks. it was sooooooo good!! didn't taste like a twinkie at all. but like a gourmet creamy dessert in a crispy dough. ahhh, i digress....
6Gross gross gross.
I honeslty dont even enjoy going to the Texas Fair anymore. I hate surrounding myself with thug kids, and overweight people eating turkey legs, drinking beer and smoking cigerettes.
I would rather go run around the lake!
7The fried twinkie I had was covered in powdered sugar and chocolate syrup. Never again....UGH!!
8i have to disagree a little bit. Fair's are once a year and the food there is so bad for you, you should only have it once a year! So why not indulge a little bit? I mean, where else can you get a friend twinkie on a daily basis? Answer, nowhere.
9i'm not a twinkie fan, so i can manage to stay away from that...but funnel cake? geez, i'll just pretend i didn't read those numbers. funnel cake is probably the only reason i'd ever go to a fair. the rides are too sketchy...i don't want to get on something that was put together in a matter of hours, yikes!
10I love this kind of food! Funnel cakes were always my favorite.
11I had some sort of deep fried beef and cheese sticks at the Renn Fest last year. It was as disgusting as it sounds, and my tummy did not thank me for it.
12I dont want to put trans fat in my body, even if it is only once a year.
13I never even heard of some of these dishes I thought my friends and I were bad splitting deep fried veggies and then having peach shortcake
14Whatever that is in the photo it looks disgusting.
15I had deep fried oreos at the rodeo fair. It wouldn't have been bad if I only had one...but I think I had about six. The first 2 tasted great, but by the time I was finished I felt sick. The flavor was worth it though haha. Only once a year baby!
16One day of indulging won't kill you, in my opinion. You simply CAN'T go to the fair and not have a funnel cake or deep-fried whatever!
17The roasted corn!! Oh, it is so good!!!
18Wow, I can't believe people would eat that stuff.
Oh wait, I did!
http://teamsugar.com/user/a+geek/album/507228
Had the (good?) fortune to be in Minneapolis for the state fair in 2004. There were so many other fried goods ready to eat....
19a gross gyro (15 yrs ago), I got so sick I still cant look at them.
20Wow, this is such an American thing!
We have "fairs" in the UK but they tend not to have foods like this at them. =)
Sometimes there are maybe doughnut stands and pork-off-the-rack stalls but nothing too major.
Oh my goodness.. I can't believe somebody would actually order a deep fried Twinkie? No wonder America is obese!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
21Ok, soooo I had funnel cake, fried snickers, and the huge turkey leg when I went to the fair. It was my first fair, so I felt I had to go all out. I would have gotten cotton candy too, but I forgot
I must say I did gain quite a few pounds. Well worth though, I must say. THE FUNNEL
CAKE!!!!!!!!!
22i really cannot believe that the funnel cake has more calories than a fried snickers or a fried cheesecake...
23I know it's gross but it's soooooooo good!!!
24I am clueless. What is a "twinkie dog sundae"?
25A twinkie dog sundae is something that will go straight to your thights and arteries!
26I usually get a funnel cake. If not at the fair at the Daffodil Festival. One time my boyf and I got an order of Fried Oreos, but did not get the funnel cake. They were good, i only had hald of one though. i usually get a sausage with peppers and onions for lunch however.
27I have to try a fried Snickers once before I die.
28Ohhh GROSS! I never touch ANy food @ fairs or carnivals or theme parks! Yuck!!!!
29none of this looks/sounds appealing! yuck...the smell alone is enough to keep me away!
30Some of that seems to rate right up there with deep fried pizza pops. Deep fried twinkies, Snickers and cheesecake? Yuck!
31LOL!!! Rodeo food is like that too, ickkkkkk! Love that you mentioned all of this, because the (South Dakota) Sioux Empire Fair (coming up!) is FULL of this junk! (Also love that you mentioned the Zipper...my personal favorite!!!)
32OMG, I LOVE funnel cake! Thanks for this list.
33At a fire company's fair, they were making Road Apples (which, being in Amish country, if you knew what they were named offer, they'd be pretty gross). Anyway, they were basically a big Oreo cookie deep fried in the batter used for funnel cakes. Just looking at it made me want to have a heart attack!
34Oh but I love Funnel cakes!!!!
35GROSS! What the hell is that in the picture?! Just the sound of "deep fried __________" makes my stomach churn.
36It is beyond me why anybody would consume something like this. What sort of mindset do you need to be in?
37Going to a fair in a couple of weeks. I will be getting cotton candy, 'fair food' of choice. I used to show at 4H exibits every year growing up by my mom would always take us to the vendor selling milk and the "home cooked" kitchen. Ahhh memories. Fried Twinkies... never came by them but have heard OF them, one time a couple of years ago my sister and I set out one drab Friday night and got the necessary ingredients for our experiment and tried them at home. Not sure if they turned out right but... eeeewwww!!!
38LOL i had no idea twinkies could be fried,..i've been living too long in europe.In south spain we usually have all kinds of candy candy,popcorn, fresh coconut,burguers, sandwiches, almonds and buñuelos (little donuts with sugar/chocolate...etc), at the night fair, and surprisingly enough the healthier tapas are served during the day fair.
39At my State Fair this year, they had deep fried Pepsi. They pour the Pepsi into the batter and fry it so quickly that it keeps some of the liquid in the little bite-size balls. I didn't like it; it's tasted like burnt cola.
40Oh, I have had the deep fried Snickers before too. It is much better, but man, you can feel your arteries clogging as you munch. I can only handle one bite.
41Our state fair had fried coke last time iw as there, but didn't try it. as i mentioned before, i tasetd a fried oreo and had a sausage. mmm.
42I live in Minneapolis, Minnesota...so I am all too aware of our state fairs obsession with foods on a stick, they introduce 1 or 2 new ones every year! I get so freaked out about eating there (after all for ALOT of people it's the main reason they go, who doesn't love fried cheese curds and entire $30 bucket of martha's chocolate chip cookies?) that I usually refuse to eat anything but this chicken vegetable pita thing, watermelon, and sometimes a fat free frozen yogurt...then I'll have a few nibbles of my boyfriends tasty fried treats he gets.
43Good Lord, why is the turkey leg so bad? Are regular turkey legs that bad for you?!
44I say that is what the Fair is for! You only live once, and you do have to walk around all day!
Funnel cake and cotton candy are my favorite! And my boyfriend LOVES the giant turkey legs.
I always pay for it the next day when my stomach hates me for putting all that fat and grease in!
45It's not really outrageous, but I love those giant dill pickles on a stick... but they are sooo messy!
46WHO EATS FRIED CHEESECAKE??..thats sooo grosss..and the fried snickers adn twinkie...omg
47I have to admit, while on a business trip, I was in Oklahoma City, and they had a cheesecake ben-yay (that is how it sounds, hav e no idea how it is spelled) anyways, I ordered it not knowing that it was indeed cheesecake, fried, and rolled in toasted coconut. May i say, that i am gladi don't live this restaurant, but boy am i happy about trying it...IT WAS DELISH! I Shared it with my coworkers so i didn't eat the whole piece (it was huge) but probably one of the best things i have ever tried dessert wise!
48Deep fried twinkies just taste so good though! My small town has a large state fair every year. Every year I end up going (even though I say I won't) and eatting all that junky fair food. My stomach hates me after, but I eat healthy the rest of the year so I figure why not?
49The Maryland Renaissance Fair has "mac & cheese on a stick" YES this means they batter & deep fry mac & cheese. I am loathe to admit that I did indeed have a bite.
50Post New Comment
Please share your opinion with our community, but make sure it is on topic and follows our Community Rules. We moderate comments and prohibit personal attacks, threats, spam, lewd images, or the promotion of your personal website.