Central Florida Fair Food

I visited the Central Florida Fair and had some carnival food. I avoided deep fried Oreos, deep fried Twinkies, deep fried bacon, or anything else deep fried and got food from a booth selling steak. The food was being cooked in big skillets and smelled much better than much of the other fair food.

I tried a sandwich called the Big John. This featured a roll filled with mashed potatoes, mushrooms, onions, peppers, and sirloin tips. The steak was nice and moist with good flavor. Mashed potatoes on sandwiches always seems strange at first glance to me, but it worked here. Overall, this was a much better choice than a corn dog...

Central Florida Fair 2012 in Orlando, FL

I returned to the Central Florida Fair this year for some carnival food. It is like getting food from Orlando's gourmet food trucks, only you actually need to worry about whether or not the food is actually up to health code! Seeing a carnie in a food stand with the ashes from the cigarette in his mouth falling onto a pizza is never a good thing. Needless to say, I avoided food from trucks like this...

The gyro stand looked good and I didn't get a vibe that I could potentially get sick from eating their food, so it was a winner!

The pita was filled with sliced lamb, lettuce, tomato, onion, and tazitiki. Greek food from food stands in fairs is always good for some reason. I'd take this over fried oreos or fried pizza any day.

Besides the gyro, ribbon fries were shared. Three large potatoes were run through a drill-powered slicing machine resulting in very long strips of potato. They were then deep fried into a crunchy mass of fresh potato chips.

 

Some horribly overpriced grilled corn was also consumed. At $3 each, the corn was definitely not worth the money, but then again, it was tasty.

 

After the fair, the food all seemed to agree with me so I must have made wise food choices!

Central Florida Fair Food 2009

The 2010 Central Florida Fair starts at the end of February, so I thought now would be a good time to finally post some food pictures from last year's 2009 Central Florida Fair. Fair/Carnival food is an interesting concept. Countless mobile food stalls that are constantly traveling around the country all assemble in one place for a week or two. While most people would be hesitant to eat food from the back of a truck in another situation, people have no problem eating like this when in the context of a fair. These food vendors can sometimes have good food, while other times the food is horrible. Some sell traditional fair food such as corn dogs and funnel cakes, while some stands sell more international foods like Greek, Chinese, and Mexican. I even saw a vegan food vendor at the fair, but it didn't look like they were doing much business. It seems the real fun starts when you start deep frying stuff that shouldn't be fried, stuff like candy bars, soda, Twinkies, and butter. Follow the consumption of some of these foods with a ride on the Tilt-A-Whirl, and you're in for a fun time...





I got food from a stand selling Cajun food called Herbert's Grill. I ordered a plate of Jambalaya, which perhaps wasn't the wisest choice from the back of a trailer. I hate to say it, but this was some of the worst Jambalaya I've ever had. The globules of pork fat that coagulated in with the meat really were unappetizing. But then again, I suppose this should have been expected when ordering something at a fair that wasn't deep fried on a stick.


While I was getting my food from Herbert's Grill, someone I was with scored these freshly made potato chips for free from another stand when they were left in the fryer too long and came out extra crispy. Even being well done, these fresh chips were really tasty, much better than my Jambalaya. Stick to the fried food at the fair I suppose...

Of course, being that the Central Florida Fair is one of the good local fairs that actually does the animal stuff besides from carnival rides, you could always buy yourself some fresh lamb chops...