North Branford Potato & Corn Festival

North Branford is a tiny little town just in from the shoreline of Connecticut. It is mostly farmland with two main crops; potatoes and corn. Hence the Potato & Corn Festival. This is a small little festival with a few midway games, a couple of shaky carnival rides, and a handful of local arts, craft and food vendors. We arrived late on a Friday afternoon, walked around a bit, listened to a friends band play on the main stage, then headed straight for the food tent. First up was my wife’s favorite, fried dough.

It has recently been brought to my attention that elsewhere in the country people may not eat fried dough the same way we do. Powdered sugar and cinnamon seem to be the toppings of choice. But for us here in New England, sauce and cheese rule. A good grated parmesan cheese adds nicely to this dish, but good…no GREAT sauce is a must. If your sauce is more like hot ketchup then I’m not interested.

This is how fried dough should be. A little bit of a crisp on the outside and fluffy and doughy on the inside. These were the perfect size fitting nicely on a paper plate with an oasis of sauce floating in the middle. The proper way to eat New England style fried dough is as follows. You start from the outer edges tearing off a piece, dip it in the sauce in the middle, pop into mouth and do your best to avoid dripping sauce on your shirt. Once the outside is gone it’s a free for all. I like to fold mine up and try to eat it like pizza. It is inevitable that sauce will drip out. Where it lands in anyone’s guess.

Being a potato and corn festival, we next hit up the potato vendor. We had to wait since they were out of both corn and potatoes. We skipped the corn (I know…) but we both got potatoes with the works. Bacon, broccoli, cheese, sour cream, and butter. They were fresh out of the cooker so we had to let them cool for a minute. Once they were cool enough to eat, we dug in.

If you’ve never had a loaded potato like this it is an experience to be had. The fresh steamed vegetables mixing with the liquid cheese, coolness of the sour cream, and moist starchiness of the potato is a medley of flavor not to be missed. As I write this I think of the potatoes from the Eastern States Expo. The North Branford potatoes could hold their own against the Maine potatoes in my opinion.

Just after we finished eating the power in the food tent went out. We had more things we wanted to try. Maybe next year.

The Eastern States Expo 2008

Ahh … The Eastern States Expo, the Northeast’s largest harvest festival.  Also known as The Big E.  I try to make it to the Big E every year but I have unfortunately missed the last two years.  This year we attended with our friends Christine and Justin.  The Big E is a haven for agriculture, entertainment, arts, crafts, and most importantly, food.  Once again I had to rely on my trusty BlackBerry for the pictures.  One of these days I’ll actually remember to bring the good camera, I promise.

Our 2008 trip to the Big E started off with beer and fried vegetables.  We got the sampler platter that included: onions, broccoli, cauliflower, mushrooms, and potatoes.  We also splurged the extra $.50 for the dipping sauce (ranch I believe it was).  Like most fair foods this tasted better than it looked.  The batter the vegetables were dipped in was unflavored but stuck really well to the veggies, which is a big plus in my book.  The sauce reminded me of a thick salad dressing but not quite as potent of a flavor.  I assume this was due to less vinegar than normally used.  Also, notice the 4 cups half full (or empty) of beer.

Next we moved on to my favorite fair food ever … Corndogs!  I go to the same stand every year to get my “first corndog of the season”.  Usually we go to the Big E the first weekend it is open with visits to several other smaller more local fairs for the remainder of the season.  This years scheduling got a little out of hand and this was my ONLY corndog of the season.  *sob*  The wife gets a little grossed out when it comes to hotdogs on a stick dipped in corn bread batter and deep fried so I got two for myself and one for Justin.  Yeah, his wife doesn’t like them either.  Anyway, what can I say about a corndog?  They’re delicious.  Corndogs are like the comfort food of fairs.  If you’ve never had one, you are missing out on a huge piece of Americana.  And the only, I repeat, ONLY condiment that should ever see a corndog is plain yellow mustard.

Next we decided it was time to drink more beers.  These came from the Guiness/Harp/Smithwick’s booth.  Justin is modeling our 2 Harp’s and 2 Smithwick’s.  This was round one.  Another followed.  

After a parade including the Budweiser Clydesdale horses pulling the cart with the signature Dalmatian on top, we moved on to my wife’s favorite fair food, fried dough.  I attempted to take a picture of it, but she had inhaled most of it before I even got my phone out of my pocket.  So for your viewing pleasure, this is all I got.  Fried dough is definitely a harvest festival “delicacy”.  You may be able to find it elsewhere, but it does not come close to ones you can find at New England harvest festivals.  I don’t know if it’s the water, the air, or the old dirty oil.  The dough is fried perfectly to the point of crispiness on the outside and chewy on the inside.  The sauce (most likely from a jar) was very lightly seasoned.  The cheese, Parmesan from a jar, is loaded on to the amount of your liking.  In my wife’s case that’s a lot.  I know it’s not gourmet but it doesn’t have to be fancy to be good.

After wandering around a bit, drinking more beers, and stopping off for a cheeseburger (it was nothing special so we’ll skip over that) I found another stand selling another great fair food.  You can make pierogis at home, but mine never come out tasting this good.  By this time I was pretty stuffed so I just went with a small plate of kielbasa & cheese.  I even skipped the dipping sauce (which is just sour cream).  These pierogis are doughier than the store bought ones and filled with much more filling.  They are boiled then fried on a flat top griddle.  The frying gives them a nice carmelization on the outside and adds a nice, almost crunchy, texture to the chewy outside and soft creamy inside.  

Just after this the wife and I got a veggie filled potato.  I can’t seem to find the picture of it but it was loaded with all sorts of steamed vegetables like broccoli, carrots, squash, and others.  It was then topped with a liquid molten cheese product.  It was insanely hot and we had to wait for it to cool down before we ate it.  To me it was a little plain.  Nothing really had any flavor to it, not even the cheese.  I prefer my baked potatoes with bacon & cheese (at least my fair potatoes).  

Each of the states that participates in the Big E has a state building.  The only one we made it to this year was Vermont.  It's chock full of maple syrup products and amazing cheese.  I headed straight for the Ben & Jerry's stand and got me a maple syrup milkshake.  Yes, it's as good as it sounds.  I didn't bother to take a picture because...to be honest I love these shakes so much I didn't want to share, so I had to suck it down as fast as possible.  Since karma is a bitch, my stomach went south after gulping down the large, heavy, thick, creamy milkshake.  It was delicious, but I paid for it afterwards.  

I’m pretty sure I missed a few small things we ate along the way, but it was a fairly warm day and I had to keep drinking beer to stay cool.  At one point I just forgot to take pictures.  For that, I apologize.  I’ll behave more next time so I can provide you with a more detailed story of my experience.