State Fairs are often an afterthought. A relic of times past when most of us lived in rural areas and guessing the weight of a pumpkin was the best entertainment of the month. They offer variations on the same rides, foods and entertainment that you find at your local Memorial Day Carnival or County Fair and, I mean, how many people even go to those? But the Minnesota State Fair is so far from an afterthought that it seems to be on the minds of Minnesotans for the 50 weeks of the year in which it is not in operation. Plans are made, new foods are devised and longed after; then, just like that, it’s over again. This year, however, the Unvegan paid a visit to see how it would all stack up.

Swedish Meatball Smorgas – The Blue Barn

It’s not all about gluttony. Sometimes it’s just about doing something no one ever thought of. Like putting Swedish meatballs on a roll, pouring white gravy all over them and then topping them with lingonberry jam and dill pickles. I was smart enough to order without the pickles and it paid off in pure sweet, salty and savory deliciousness.

Mangonada Shave Ice – Minnesnowii Shave Ice

You wouldn’t think Minnesotans would be fans of shave ice since they live among it for so much of the year. Yet, the Mangonada is real and it is fascinating. Packed with mango syrup, drizzles of chamoy sauce, popping boba (for some inexplicably genius reason), spicy tajin powder and a tamarind straw (for some inexplicably strange reason). The straw was useless, but the rest of this was somehow light, refreshing, hearty and spicy at once. And with all that, it just somehow worked.

Giant Juicy Turkey Sandwich – Turkey To Go

Being a first timer, I couldn’t just go with new stuff. And, frankly, I wasn’t too excited about getting a turkey sandwich. But, my buddy told me it was well worth it and, well, it sure was. I added bacon and a sweet glaze to mine and it was unbelievably juicy for what’s generally the driest fowl of all. As I drove past many a wild turkey in the Northwoods, all I could think about was how juicy they could be in sandwich form.

Blu – Grain Belt

I love blueberries and I love beer. It makes sense that I would like a blueberry beer, right? Wrong. It seems to be that the special beers at the Minnesota State Fair are pretty much all sweet, but this took that sweetness way beyond balance and into juice territory. Good thing I had all kinds of savory and salty foods to counter that sweetness (and don’t worry, I still drank the whole damn thing).

Gizmo – Carl’s

The Gizmo is another classic, and yet it is churned out by pretty much the most nondescript cart in the whole fair. Sometimes you just know you’re good and it’s hard to go bad when you are an Italian roll filled with ground beef, Italian sausage, red sauce and a layer of melted mozzarella cheese to seal all of the goodness in.

Sweet Greek Cheese Puffs – Dino’s Gyros

Ricotta and Feta. Flaky phyllo dough. Powdered sugar. More than a drizzle of honey. I am a many who loves his sweet and salty combos and these Sweet Greek Cheese Puffs did more than satisfy that craving. It may have gotten a but too sweet toward the end when the honey congregated in the corner with the remaining puff, but these were a treat.

Zesty PB&J Sausage – Gass Station Grill

It doesn’t sound right. Nope, not at all. But if you’ve been paying attention to burger places lately, mixing peanut butter, jelly and some sort of spiciness is all the rage. It’s only natural that it made its way into a tube steak. While each bite may have been somewhat inconsistent, there is no doubt that this works. If they can get that peanut buttery and jelly-y goodness more evenly distributed, this sausage could take over the world.

Turducken Sausage – Giggles’ Campfire Grill

Not all sausages are created equal. Or is it something about the size of the sausage versus what you do with it? Regardless, the Turducken sausage didn’t just lose the battle of the sausages, it barely seemed to fight. It was too tightly packed, the grind seemed off and really all I could taste was the turkey, with maybe a touch of chicken. Perhaps in years past this may have flown, but in the world of the Zesty PB&J sausage you have to be oh so much better than this.

Passion Fruit Pilsner – Bent Paddle Brewing

Duluth is a cool city. And it sent a pretty cool beer down to the state fair. It’s not a sour per se, but does it’s best to harness the tartness of passion fruit and churns out a pretty unique pilsner that is not too sweet and not too sour. It’s not just right either, but it’s good enough to make the drinking enjoyable.

Bacon-Wrapped Pork Belly – The Hangar

You don’t go to the state fair looking to eat a balanced meal. But nowhere is that lack of balance more exemplified than in this pork on pork action on a stick. It was so unbelievably juicy, smokey and salty forcing the use of dozens of napkins lest your face runneth with juices that would later congeal into something resembling a wax museum. While this may be perfection in meat form, the critic in me did wish there was some sort of a sweet and acidic dipping sauce like apple cider vinaigrette or a cherry reduction to accompany this meaty concoction. Despite that, the universe seemed to pause in recognition of the beauty of each bite of this masterpiece.

Fried Cheese Curds – Everywhere

Some day I’d like to pull an Andrew Zimmern and try every cheese curd purveyor at the fair. Until that day, I am a satisfied man as long as the place knows to stick with the white variety of cheddar, to fry them just right amount of time to maintain the squeakiness and to only lightly batter them lest the batter overpower the cheese. It’s not the tallest order, but it’s not the easiest one to fulfill either. Plus, when you’re coming from Arizona all cheese curds are good cheese curds.

Whelp. That’s a wrap. The pilgrimage is complete. Now if only I can figure out a way to make this an annual thing…or at least get to Iowa somehow…

There is no denying that much of my heart belongs in the state of Wisconsin, where I spent many summers of my life. So when Michigan loses a football game to Wisconsin, I may hate it, but I’m also weirdly more okay with it than I am with losing to just about any other team. But what does this have to do with food? Well, Wisconsin produced a fast food place called Culver’s, which is actually in Phoenix. So afters years of not being in Wisconsin, I revisited the Scottsdale location of Culver’s to see if it could bring me back to my days in Wisconsin.

I ordered up a Double Cheddar Butterburger with Bacon because, I mean, obviously. And what’s really cool about Culver’s is that they don’t add any other ingredients unless requested, so my burger was literally just bacon and cheddar. On top of that,  instead of some crappy typical fries or whatever for the side, I went with Wisconsin Cheese Curds.

The burger was a thing of fast food beauty. The cheese had been reasonably melted and the patties were cooked in the ideal fast food way, with some crispiness around the edges and a slightly chewy interior. The bun was also nice and soft, doing a great job of handling contents. Probably the only thing that seemed a little subpar was the bacon, which was just whatevsies.

As for the cheese curds, they were a little overly breaded for my taste. Full disclosure, I prefer my cheese curds naked and unfried, so I’m always a little undersatisfied with fried curds, but at least if you’re going to do it I prefer a light breading and these weren’t light. Nonetheless, they were plenty squeaky and I mean, beggars can’t really be choosers when you’re living in Arizona.

In the end, Culver’s brings a Midwestern flair to fast food, which is certainly a good thing, but it’s still inhibited to a certain degree by being fast food. If they can figure out how to work fresh cheese curds into their supply chain, though, the game would change forever.

One of the greatest regrets of my life is failing to capture a better picture at lunch at Little Daddy’s. You see, Little Daddy’s is a Greek-style diner in Southfield, Michigan, with locations in Taylor and Bloomfield Hills as well. It’s kind of like a Coney Island, but more Greek, which means they serve up saganaki. Saganaki is not a misspelling of the Japanese city of Nagasaki. No, it is a flaming cheese.

And so when I looked at the menu and found something called the Flaming Opa Cheeseburger, I was excited as a little kid. That’s because “opa!” is what the staff yell out when the cheese gets lit on fire. So as they brought out the dish to flame up my cheese, I was too excited to get my camera out and snag a picture of my flaming cheeseburger.

But it’s not the process that matters as much as the burger itself. And as you can tell by the picture up above, this was one sexy burger that I had to put together myself the way it was served. It may not look like a lot, but the combination of these flavors worked in a delicious way. Due to the flaming, the cheese has a bit of a crispy crust to it, adding a texture element, and is also melty without melting quite to the level of your typical sliced cheeses. Plus, to put the flame out they use lemons, so there is a tart/sour kick to the cheese as well. Finally, there were the juices left behind in the dish that made for a great sandwich dipping sauce on occasion.

Was the burger patty itself anything special? No, not really. It wasn’t anything to complain about either – along the lines of what you would expect from a burger at a diner. But what really matters is the fact that Little Daddy’s made the bold, yet amazingly simple move to add saganaki to a burger and the world is a better place for it.

A lot can happen in 7 years. You could meet a woman, call her your girlfriend for a while, then fiancee, then wife and then mother of your child. You could move from LA to Pittsburgh to and then to Pasadena, with a brief sojourn into Buffalo. Or you could, you know, start a meat-centric food blog and keep it going for as long as Brad Pitt spent in Tibet.

To celebrate 7 years of The Unvegan, I decided to celebrate with a sandwich. But this wasn’t just any sandwich – no this sandwich had to be epic in unvegan-ness. It had to be 7 meats and 7 cheeses, with nothing but olive oil and bread to join them. Fortunately, I have one of LA’s best Italian Delis down the street, which goes by the name of Roma Market.

I asked for a sandwich with 7 meats and 7 cheeses. It was made clear to me that this request had never been made before, but the meat and cheese slicer man was up for the challenge. Well almost…you see, there were only 4 cheeses available. So I watched as he delicately sliced the meats and cheeses and placed them upon the bread. Then I immediately ran to the grocery store nearby to add 3 more cheeses to this masterpiece. So without further ado, I give you the 7 Years of Unvegan Sandwich (which you should definitely ask for at Roma Market and reference this post).

Meats:

1. Mortadella (ground, heat-cured pork with pistachios)
2. Capicola (dry-cured pork neck)
3. Prosciutto (dry-cured pork leg/thigh)
4. Bresaola (air-dried, salted beef)
5. Soppresatta (spicy, cured dry sausage)
6. Mild Coppa (basically the same thing as capicola and mild to not overwhelm)
7. Roast Beef (beef that is roasted)

Cheeses:

1. Swiss
2. Provolone
3. Gouda
4. Mozzarella
5. Mild Cheddar (so as to not overwhelm the sandwich)
6. Pepper Jack
7. Muenster

The last three cheeses were those unavailable at Roma, but that extra effort only made the 7 Years of Unvegan that much more delicious. Would it have been more reasonable to eat each meat individually? Absolutely. Would I have just been happy with Roma Market’s famously simple sandwich? Debatable. You see, when you have a chance to grab life by the bread and chow down on 7 different types of meat, you take it.

EDIT: This review is of the original. The new Salt’s Cure is apparently bigger and better. We shall see…oh yes…we shall see.

My continued quest for amazing burgers took me to a place called Salt’s Cure in West Hollywood. At this particular intersection, only one of the corners lacks burgers, as the other two are populated by Fatburger and Astro Burger. And while Salt’s Cure isn’t strictly a burger place, a quick look at the high priced menu on the wall when I walked in all but guaranteed I would be eating their burger.

We began by ordering one of their homemade pretzels and a plate of cheese and meat to join it. We went with all three cheeses on the menu, two of which were creamy and the third was blue-ish. As for the meat, we chose the pork shoulder, which turned out to be prepared as a cured meat dish. Not exactly the pork shoulder I was accustomed to seeing, but it certainly fit the bill of the restaurant. These were also served with homemade bread sticks (the crunchy sort), homemade raisin bread, plus some walnuts, raisins and a fruity jam. Basically, it was an awesome spread, except for one thing – pickles. Never before had I seen pickles on a cheese plate and I hope to never see them again. These unwanted veggies ruined at least two slices of bread with their juices (fortunately the fiancee ate those) and generally turned the assortment ugly. Luckily, the cheeses were delicious, as cheese tends to be, and the pork shoulder was also quite stellar. It wasn’t overly salty or seasoned, but cured in a way that released the natural flavor of the piggy in a really delicious manner.

As for the main course, I went with their Bacon Cheeseburger. At 17 bucks, this clocked in as the cheapest entree and was topped with lettuce and onion, with a side of homemade fries. I ordered mine without the lettuce and onion, and was pretty surprised when the burger arrived and wasn’t the size of my head. Not that the thing was small, but for some crazy reason I still associate price with size. I guess I’m just old fashioned like that. The burger was topped with one thick slice of bacon and the white cheddar cheese was oozing down the sides of the guy. I must admit that the burger was quite thick and had been perfectly shaped to fit the upscale poppy seed bun.

As far as the taste breakdown, the burger was definitely awesome. The cheese and bacon were both of the highest quality and flavor. The meat itself had been cooked to more of a medium than medium rare, but was still impeccably juicy. So juicy in fact that I feared for the life of the bun. Fortunately, these fears were unfounded, as the bun held up strong against the onslaught of burger juice. The meat also had a nice, thick grind to it and had clearly been pressed into a perfectly round shape. I’m always torn when places do this. I know it makes the burger easier to cook and fit into a bun, but it also sometimes makes me feel as though the burger had been sitting in the back for a while rather than being made just for me. Nonetheless, the burger was great.

Then there were the fries. Quite often, homemade fries wind up in strange sizes and uneven cooking (likely due to the strange sizes). As opposed to the burgers, it seems to be better to have uniformity to fries. At Salt’s Cure, though, the fries were nicely sliced into crunchy-on-the-outside and soft-on-the-inside pieces. This made me a happy man, and they also lived up to their name by seasoning the fries with just the right amount of salt.

The burger at Salt’s Cure was definitely one worth having. I loved the place’s stress on doing things in-house or local, but they were not without flaw. For one, their menu was incredibly limited. Sure, the meaty options were there, but seriously there were only like 5 entrees and the burger was the only one under 25 bucks. And that brings me to my next issue. Yes, the burger was delicious, but $17 delicious? Not quite. It was absolutely worth the visit, I’m just struggling with finding a reason to go back.

Some people just can’t be satisfied until they have made everyone else unhappy. Neal Barnard is one of these people. Not only is he an advocate of the vegan (malnourishment) diet, he has now taken his attack upon humanity to the billboards.

In an all out attack on cheese, Barnard and his Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine have unleashed a couple of billboards purporting to show the “negative” affects of cheese. Both display intensely overweight individuals with such creative taglines as “Your Abs on Cheese.” Yes, that is a throwback to the ’80s and ’90s “Your Brain on Drugs” PSAs like the one starring the beautiful Rachel Leigh Cook.

To check out the billboards, head on over here.

So this Barnard character claims that cheese is the reason we Americans are so obese. Well, I probably eat more than the 31 pounds of cheese that the average American does every year and don’t feel obese at all. And I bet I’m not alone.

But while I may be an anomaly, most people would probably say it’s cool to have cheese every once in a while. Not so with Barnard. He says it should never be eaten, which is even more outlandish than those billboards. Just because he’s lactarded doesn’t mean he should be taking it out on the well-balanced individuals in this world.

Fortunately, Barnard has a website with contact information, so if you’re anything like me and want to take a stand against his absurd claims, feel free to drop him a line.

(via NPR and my old buddy Michelle)

On another fantastic trip to Disneyland, this one filled with wheelchairs and electric scooters from scooter sleuth rather than roller coasters, we ended up at Cafe Orleans for lunch. More upscale than your average Disneyland restaurant, Cafe Orleans is located in the heart of New Orleans Square, not far from Pirates of the Caribbean. Serving up French-influenced food, they had a good-looking menu with a couple unvegan options.

Since I had been and would continue to push a wheelchair all day, I figured I needed to load up on some heavy foods, beginning with an appetizer. I started with their Pommes Frites, which is just a fancy French word for French fries. But these weren’t your ordinary fries. They were covered in cheese and garlic, which you could smell all the way to The Haunted Mansion. Fortunately, the garlic and parmesan weren’t overkill. There was just enough flavor and the fries had been fried to a perfect crisp. They came with a bit of a Cajun sauce that provided a nice balance to the cheese and garlic flavor.

On top of that cheese, my main course got even cheesier. I ordered the Three-Cheese Monte Cristo (presumably named after the Count). This was mozzarella, swiss and brie, fried in some batter. It came with a berry sauce for dipping and was sprinkled with powdered sugar. When I first read the ingredients, I was under the impression I was getting the French version of grilled cheese. Instead, I found myself faced with one intense meal. The sugariness of the sauce and powdered sugar coupled with the salty cheesiness was one delicious meal. The batter ad been fried crispy enough that you could eat it with your hands, but it was really a dish best eaten with fork and knife. When things got too heavy, it was served with some grapes and strawberries to make me feel better about myself.

The only real downside of this meal was how truly heavy it was. After only eating half, I was a full unvegan. I boxed up the rest to tackle another day, then departed Cafe Orleans for an afternoon of wheelchair pushing to work off one tasty and destructive meal.

Taking advantage of a special from Living Social, the girlfriend and I headed to Cobras & Matadors in Mid-City for a bit of a date night. The place specializes in tapas and is BYO with a slight corkage fee. We forgot the booze, so had to make up for it in food instead. The deal was for 70 bucks worth, so that meant we had a lot of tapas to eat. As usual, I eyed cheeses and meats, and was happy to be eating small plates because so much looked good.

We narrowed our tapas list down to something reasonable and placed our order. First and foremost were the bacon-wrapped dates (blue cheese, almond and port wine), followed by burrata in a jar (basil, olive oil, grilled bread and sea salt), baked Spanish goat cheese (port honey wine reduction, warm grapes) paprika spiced patatas and an order of oven roasted mussels for the girlfriend. It was a good start and we looked forward to downing our tapas.

First up was the burrata. This delicious, creamy derivative of mozzarella tasted amazing when spread across the pieces of bread that came with it. Not content to be a simple burrata, the flavor of basil and olive oil made the burrata in a jar a great way to start the meal. By the time the bread was finished, there was still burrata in the jar, so we saved what we had in the hopes that it could enhance a later dish.

Our next plate was the bacon-wrapped dates. Aside from the strange green plants (they looked like clovers, but do people eat clovers?!) garnishing the tops of the dates, they looked incredibly delicious. But with only four of them, I was bothered that they were 10 bucks. Had I not been getting a Living Social deal, this would have really gotten to me, put I pushed the thought from my mind and dug in. I found some very welcoming dates with nice, crisp bacon. Inside, the almonds added a nice crunch, but I found a lack of blue cheese. I don’t know if this was forgotten or what, but blue cheese is certainly a flavor that sticks out and refuses to be subtle. As if to apologize for this lack, the dates had been placed upon a wide, thin sheet of Italian meat that was essentially a pepperoni. It was a pleasant surprise, but I’m not sure if it was enough to make up for the missing cheese.

Next came the paprika spiced patatas. These were sort of like potato wedges, but in little chunks the size of home fries. Covering both American and European styles, they were served with ketchup and aioli, but I found an even better condiment: burrata! That’s right, although the ketchup went well with the patatas, I scraped what was left of the burrata and created a tasty mega-tapa not to be reckoned with.

Finally, my last dish came (remember the mussels weren’t for me), the baked Spanish goat cheese. Wow I love goat cheese. It was served on some bread with a reduction that ended up tasting a lot like balsamic. The combination was pretty tasty, but I couldn’t help thinking I could easily make this at home. The warm grapes that came with it, on the other hand, were simply weird. I don’t know why people decided it would be fun to warm up grapes, but to those people I have a message: If you’re going to heat them up, make sure you heat them enough that they dry and become raisins. Otherwise, keep them cold because they are just better that way.

With all of our dishes served, it was time to choose a dessert. And what dessert should we choose? More cheese! Yep, none of the actual desserts compared to how attractive the cheese platter was. I’m not really sure what cheeses were served aside from blue (stolen from my dates?) and some slices of what I assumed were Manchego. Yet, whatever they were – coupled with candied walnuts, apricot jam and some grilled bread – these cheeses made for a perfect unvegan dessert.

The cheese platter was a perfect way to end a great tapas meal. I always say there can never be too much cheese and this meal proved it. Plus, it doesn’t hurt to have some bacon, pepperoni and potatoes thrown in there.

Where the mac and cheese balls from World Fare were my appetizer at the Silver Lake Jubilee, I still needed to find myself a main course. After a long stroll around the trucks, I found myself at a truck that I had never seen before, called Lee’s Philly. Lee’s Philly is born of the same vein as many of the Kogi-style food trucks. Their specialty is gogi beef, but while they have fused it with tacos and burritos, they have also created a Philly cheese steak out of the stuff. Wording on their truck claims that they have “LA’s Best Gogi,” but I took it upon myself to be the true judge of that.

I decided to order their Gogi Cheese Steak and when I asked what came with it, the lady told me it was beef and onions topped with cheese. Aside from the onion part, this sounded great, plus it came with chips for only $5.99. I ordered it without those terrible onions and waited a few minutes for it to be ready. It came rolled up in a combination of tin foil of paper. I peeled away the layers and it looked deliciously onion free. Then I took a bite. There was a crunch. Onions? No, kimchi! I walked back up to the truck with a sad look on my face and explained to the lady that I had no idea it would come with kimchi. She then explained to be that the kimchi was a part of the gogi style. I’m no Korean, so I wasn’t exactly in a position to argue with her, but I was under the impression that gogi only applied to the way the beef was cooked and had nothing to do with extraneous vegetables such as kimchi. Nonetheless, she offered to give me a regular cheese steak to replace it and I accepted.

When it was ready, I repeated the ritual of unwrapping. When I made it through the wrapping, I found that the beef looked less seasoned than the other one, and when I bit in my fear was confirmed. The beef didn’t really have much flavor and the cheese also didn’t add much. It’s hard to mess up cheese and steak, so I am hesitant to say that there was anything wrong with this sandwich, but it certainly was missing a special something that bulgogi beef may have added. Instead, it was just an ordinary cheese steak that failed to satisfy my desire for delicious fusion.

For the birthday of a special someone in my life, we headed to little French restaurant called AOC. You may be wondering what AOC stands for, and so did we. Apparently it is not some made-up acronym, but actually is the French version of the FDA, which makes it far more pretentious and Frenchier. We had a reservation and were seated immediately, as I would expect from the French. Our waitress, who had an indistinguishable accent that most certainly was not French, brought us our menus so we could figure out some foodstuffs.

The menu was a bit confusing, but we go our bearings and decided to start out with some cheeses. Not knowing too much about cheese except that I’ve never met a cheese I didn’t like, we let the waitress decide. One cheese was $5, while a three-cheese platter was $15. Not sure why they had to tell us the price of a platter of three cheeses since it was just three times the amount for a single cheese and wasn’t discounted, but that must be some sort of French thing I can’t comprehend. She picked out a goat cheese from Sardinia, Italy called Pantaleo, a sheep cheese from the Loire Valley in France called Le Berger de Rocastin and finally some good old fashioned cow cheese from Burgundy, France called Chaource. No, I can’t pronounce any of them, but I can tell you that they were all mighty tasty. We also had some bread, which came with a nice semi-spicy spread that was really good and could easily be coupled with the cheeses.

For the main course, I decided to get into some white meat. The white meat I chose was listed on the menu as Grilled Chicken, Roasted Roots, Aged Balsamic. I asked the waitress what roasted roots entailed, hoping she would bust out into a song by Rusted Root, but instead she told me it was potatoes. Really? Couldn’t just put potatoes down on the menu? At least it wasn’t vegetables.

When my chicken arrived, it was surprisingly small for the $14 price tag. It tasted good, to be sure, and this was greatly aided by some sort of a puree that the chicken was laying upon. Nonetheless, I cannot take away from the fact that the seasoning on the chicken was pretty good. The potatoes, I mean uhh the roasted roots also tasted nice, but I spotted a couple carrots in the mix. Definitely a root, but definitely not a potato.

By the time I finished that little piece of chicken, I was definitely full, unfortunately this wasn’t because of the chicken itself. I had to eat a ton of bread to fill up this unvegan tummy of mine. It was great that they kept refilling the bread, but I would have liked the main course to do the job of filling me up.