Let's Go Retro! The 2024 San Diego County Fair (Part Two- it's happening now)

mmm-yoso!!!, a food blog, is being written by Cathy while Kirk and His Missus are enjoying these sweltering days in an area of aquatic coolness. 

I wrote a post about the 2024 San Diego County Fair, before it opened, a few weeks ago.  The Mister and I have attended the Fair a couple of times and will go again.  Here's a post about what you might see if you go there now.  It is closed on Mondays and Tuesdays and the last day is Sunday July 7.

 The front gate is crowded just past the metal detectors at 11 a.m.

 The Midway, with rides and  food booths There's Chicken Charlie, checking out a couple of his food booths as the Fairgrounds opened!
 The Fun Zone, with Carnival Games, is a typical American Fair activity.

The various Exhibit Halls are filled with so many judged entries

 Home Made, Gems & Minerals, Design in Wood
 The Paul Ecke, Jr. Flower Show, along with the Paul Ecke, Jr. Garden Show with the entry from the San Diego County Model Railroad Museum
 The Future Farmers of America were preparing to show goats..

There is a LOT more to do at the Fair, and that will be showing in my 'wrap up' post.  For now, let's talk about food.

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 Walking outside the Livestock Barn is an informative area sponsored by Hollandia Dairy.  Dairy cows were on display and a small booth was selling chilled bottles of Hollandia Dairy milk for $3.  There was signage indicating that these bottles were also being sold at Frazier Farms stores until the end of the Fair.  This Dutch Coffee milk tasted very fresh and was an unexpected treat.

 There are three adult-only 'Specialty Booths' at the fair-The Beer Experience,
 The Wine Experience,

 and "Destination Unknown", a sort of Speakeasy (you need to tell the password to the elevator attendant who will whisk you up to the rooftop bar overlooking the Race Track).

In the first Fair post, I linked the Food Map along with the $5 "Taste of the Fair food samples available on Wednesdays and Thursdays

 The Texas Style BBQ booth offered a 'BBQ Sundae'- mashed potatoes topped with plenty of hickory smoked meat, some bark, some BBQ sauce and topped with a grape tomato.  Tasting this BBQ absolutely made both of us want to order a full plate.

 A 12 ounce Aqua Fresca at Ricos Manjares Mosita (cucumber lime flavor) was worth the $5 and so refreshing.

 San Diego's Original Fish & Chips offered clam chowder fries.  French fries topped with a lovely, thick chowder filled with clams, some potatoes and topped with crumbles of bacon.  Definitely a chowder I would order if it was cooler.

 The Texas Donuts offered their plain glazed donut for $5 (regular $7) and it was kind of perfect.  We've always thought this booth has reasonable prices.  
 OH MY!  Dipping Dots 'taste' was a five ounce root beer float.  Wonderful tasting root beer.  Topped with vanilla Dipping Dots, it really was a different type of 'float'.

 On our second visit, we saw this Rowdy's Root Beer Float booth and it was also offering a $5 taste.  We had to.  Ten ounces of soft serve ice cream and not as much root beer; memories evoked and well, soft serve.

 This blurred out booth,'Eat At Joe's' was selling various fried items (zucchini, chicken strips, curly fries) the Taste of the Fair special was cheese curds!   The curds didn't 'squeak' when biting in, but were very tasty...as batter fried cheese should be.
 Maddie's Churros was offering one made-to-order churro and it hit the spot.  You know, fried dough rolled in cinnamon sugar...
 The Squeezers Lemon shaped booths are always part of the Fair and this year offered a 'Sour Apple Lemonade', small size (12 ounce) as a Taste.   First, the color.  Second- the flavors.  The mix of sour apple flavor and fresh lemons was really unique.  Another refreshing beverage.

 The Pan Fried Chicken booth offered two fried wings, hot sauce, carrots and celery with Ranch dressing for $5!  One drum, one flat and quite large.  Another mini-meal.

 We saw the Freeze Dried Candy booth last year but never stopped.  This time we did; I've been curious for a year. Quite nice and different.

 Of course, when leaving, we stopped here, as almost everyone does- always see people carrying large bags of Kettle Corn out the main gate.  The small sample of Kettle Corn made it home and even lasted a few days.  It was great; large, mushroom shaped popped corn coated in sugar and salt.   A Perfect treat.

 One thing we will pay regular price for is a turkey leg ($22).  Since we seem to only find raw turkey eggs (weight about two pounds) for $9/pound, it is worth it for us to purchase a large leg already smoked.
 We brought this one home, cooked some corn (3/$1) on the grill and had a nice dinner.

I hope you can get to the Fair.  Each of the samples we tried were excellent and were incentive to order something full size from that booth on our next visit.

Soo and Maggie also attended the Fair this year!

2024 San Diego County Fair Website Purchase tickets and parking online.  Open until July 7 (closed Monday and Tuesday)

Comments

[Peter]

Thanks for the detailed report, Cathy! My wife and I had a great time at the Fair a couple days ago on her birthday. Started out with a couple mochas at the Bird Rock Coffee Roasters VW Microbus hidden in the garden area, then wandered around looking at all the exhibits. Picked up a cinnamon roll then made our way up to Destination Unknown where we had some very tasty and potent mai tais. Walked through the ride area, got our annual photo booth pix, then picked up a bag of that kettle corn on the way out!

[Som Tommy]

Going tomorrow, can’t wait. Thanks for the preview

[kat]

looks like it will be a lot of fun

[Soo]

How was Rowdy's root beer? Did they make their own root beer? Thanks for all the fair info. I did try some of the Taste of the Fair deals. :-)

[Cathy]

What a wonderful time you had, Peter! There are so many 'retro' displays and photo spots around to remind us of the theme of the Fair...but a lot of them are from my lifetime, so don't seem too old. Photo booth pictures taken at the Fair is a great birthday memory (Happy belated to your wife!).

Enjoy it all, ST! There's so much to see and do and eat.

The Fair seems to be getting back to 'normal', kat. Covid changed things a lot. There is so much to see and do.

Because the soft serve ice cream mixed in with the root beer, the flavor wasn't as 'distinct' at Rowdy's as the separate root beer topped with Dipping Dots, Soo. It was still good and brought back some good memories (and cravings) from long ago..