COLUMBUS, Ohio – It’s Fair Time!
The 161st edition of the Ohio State Fair kicks off Wednesday (9:00 a.m.) at the Expo Center on the Northeast Side and runs through Aug. 3.
EXTRA: Ohio State Fair
Governor John Kasich will join general manager Virgil Strickler in opening ceremonies and will tour parts of the fairgrounds with his wife, Karen, and their twin 14-year-old daughters, Emma and Reese. Ohio’s governor routinely opens the event, but it is unusual to make it a family affair.
Of course, this is an election year and Kasich is seeking another term in office, opposed by Democrat Ed FitzGerald, the Cuyahoga County executive.
New artery-hardening food items on the midway include the “sloppy donut,” a donut sandwich stacked high with BBQ pulled pork, deep fried pickle chips, bacon and cheese; a battered, deep-fried blend of insect larvae and cream cheese and chicken and waffles on a stick, a fair twist on the popular southern classic.
An all-bacon vendor — Bubba’s Bacon – serves up a bacon ball on a stick, a quarter-pound of bacon on a stick, bacon popcorn, chocolate-covered bacon and hot-dog-on-a-stick and sausage-on-a-stick, both wrapped in bacon.
New attractions this year — including a bear show and a gymnastics and dance performance – will compete for fairgoers’ attention with tried-and-true exhibits like the butter sculpture
The butter cow and calf – “Scarlet and Grayce” – share their space with Ohio icons carved from butter, including a whitetail deer, paw paw fruit, carnation and spotted salamander.
The names were announced Tuesday by fair officials after a naming contest on Twitter and are a play on the Ohio State University colors, scarlet and gray.
The butter cow sculpture goes back more than a century at the state fair.