American comfort food served deep fried style

In 1882, a group of Fresno businessmen, farmers and ranchers met with the idea and goal of bringing the community together. Two years later in 1884, the first Fresno Fair ran for five days. Present day, the Big Fresno Fair is the fifth largest fair in California with an average attendance of 550,000. In 2015, it was the 29th largest fair in the USA, drawing just over 608,000 people from around the Central Valley.

The Big Fresno Fair provides 12 days of excitement for friends and family to come and enjoy a variety of exhibits, foods and rides. Other attractions include the Table Mountain Concert Series which includes names like MercyMe, Cole Swindell and Flo Rida and horse races. Last year, the fair unveiled the bottom floor to a new attraction, the Fresno County Historical Museum. This year the whole building is open.

Livestock

The livestock exhibit, located on the southwest corner of the fair, allows farmers, 4-H and FFA students to showcase their animals. Visitors can see cows, goats, poultry, donkeys, swine and other animals in this exhibit.

Rebecca is a parent of a 4-H student. She enjoys volunteering and the opportunity to educate people on their animals they brought.

“I’m a parent of a 4-H student and I’m volunteering to help educate the community on our animals,” Rebecca said. “Our animals include rabbits and chickens. This is my first year doing this and it’s awesome. I love it.”

Junior Exhibits

The Junior Exhibits building showcases the work of Fresno County youth, ages 9-19. There are many different things in this building ranging from clothing to food, pictures to paintings, wood projects and more.

Norma Dell works in the Junior Exhibits building. She enjoys seeing the creativity of the students in all their projects.

“This is my second year working here,” Dell said. “We work in this building for a month and a half. We come in and set up, then we decorate. Soon after we receive entries and set them up for judging and then display them. The best part is seeing all of the creativity of the students in what they come up with. But it’s also a lot of hard work. We put a lot of hours setting up displays and getting things to look right on the walls.”

The Greenhouse

When walking into the Greenhouse, visitors are instantly stunned by the beauty of the arrangements of floriculture displays. Inside many will find sweet smelling flowers, exotic orchids and bonsai trees. There are also demonstrations and booths set up to give tips on how to keep a home garden looking beautiful.

Jennifer Waite, superintendent of the Greenhouse building, manages the people and plants within the building and has worked in that department for 18 years.

“This is my 23rd year at the fair and my 18th year in this department,” Jennifer said. “I’m the superintendent of the building so I manage people and plants. I love what I do; after 18 years it’s hard not to. For me, the best part about the fair is the exhibitors. If you’re here in this building and you look around, you see the names of people on the plants. Every one of those people are now after all these years friends. It’s a wonderful job and I enjoy having the best of everyone’s house plants to play with and design with. The hardest part about it is the long hours of the day.

Gem & Mineral

Upon entering the Gem & Mineral building visitors are greeted with glistening stones, such as diamonds, emeralds, amethyst and over 100 kinds more on display. Along with gems, the building features silversmithing, petrified wood, fossils, hand-crafted jewelry and other silver-work that can be purchased.

Shirleen has been a member of a rock club that attends the Big Fresno Fair for a year. She hopes to promote her club and get children interested in what they have to say.

“We promote our club and try to get kids interested in rocks,” Shirleen said. “I’ve only been with the club since last year at the fair. I love it the club. Joining it is one of the best things I ever did. I love learning how to make jewelry, and the classes are free too. There’s a lot of nice friendly people.

Fine Arts & Photography

The Fine Arts & Photography building boasts the largest collection of local artwork in Fresno County with hundreds of artists and photographers showcasing over 1,400 items annually. This building includes paintings, photographs, metalwork and sculptures.

For the last three years, Vishina has worked as the Fine Arts & Photography coordinator and curator. She loves being able to see all the unique talent and hearing different people’s stories.

“I am the Fine Arts & Photography coordinator and curator,” Vishina said. “I’ve been doing it for three years and I love it. Some of the best parts about working here is seeing all the different talent, meeting different people and hearing their stories, and how and why they created a piece. Really the hardest part is dealing with customers and people who aren’t really here to see the art and just come in to be mean sometimes. It’s the fair; there’s all sorts of people that come through here.

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 Wells Fargo Agriculture

The Wells Fargo Agriculture exhibit is a world-renowned building due to the fact that the Central Valley is the world’s top agricultural area. From A to Z, apples to zucchini, visitors can see more than 300 locally grown food items on creative displays.

Robin Rodgers is a judge in the Agriculture building. She judges for four days and has been doing it for 14 years. She loves the community aspect of the fair.

“I judge the produce in the building,” Rodgers said. “I do four days of judging on all the community booths and on their originality and their creativity. We do all the produce and we judge against all the different communities. I’ve been doing it about 14 years, and my boss has been doing it for 37. The best part about is probably the PR in the communities, all the people working all together to bring the produce in here. It takes a lot of work and there’s a lot of old timers that have been doing these booths for many, many years. It’s really hard trying to get the younger generation to come in and take over.

Food

The annual food at the fair is unlike any other place. Many can find sugary, sticky, salty almost anywhere within the grounds. I tried three things by way of recommendations from friends: a soft rolled taco, an orange float, and a deep fried Oreo.

At the soft rolled taco place, a taco cost $3 and was on the smaller side while a bottle of water cost $3. The taco seemed cheap and the water was definitely expensive. Not being a huge Mexican food fan, I surprised myself when I got in line to get another after I finished my first.

The orange float from the Fruit Caboose was delicious, but nothing spectacular. It consisted of vanilla ice cream in orange soda. You can’t really go wrong with that combination and it was approximately $6 dollars for a small.

Chicken Charlies is famous for its various deep-fried food options. I have never tried anything deep-fried before today when I ordered the Oreos. For $6.95 buyers will receive four Oreos that honestly appeared disgusting. I hate to say it, but I ate all four because they were so good, but I actually felt sick afterwards.

The Fresno Fair ends Oct. 16 so make sure you can attend before it ends! Who knows, you may be able to try your favorite food deep-fried style.

This author can be reached via twitter @alexrurik23 and via email Alexander Rurik.