Have you ever heard of Texas Sheet Cake? How about the Meat Biscuit? Or the Funnel Cake? These are all State Fair food creations!
As we are wrapping up State Fair season, it’s worth noting that the State Fair remains one of the most highly coveted places to showcase prize-winning home food creations ever since the State Fair concept was created. And we have one man to thank for this uniquely American movement.
Fairs have operated for centuries in Europe and were no exception in the American colonies. Food, flamboyant entertainment, wine and beer were common offerings during Medieval times in Europe and a two-day agricultural fair was organized in York (Pennsylvania) as early as 1765. The agricultural fair was a place where you could buy and sell livestock for work, recreation or as a food source for your family.
However, there is something distinctly unique about today's State or County Fair that is credited to one man: PRIZES.
The concept of the State or County Fair was birthed in 1807 in Pittsfield, Massachusetts when Elkanah Watson brought his sheep to the public square. Under the great Elm he gathered his flock and clanged an old ship’s bell with a piece of iron, calling on local farmers to raise sheep because their Merino wool was of superior quality. He was so passionate about creating agricultural exchanges to help communities flourish in the new America, he created the Berkshire Agricultural Society and began to hold fairs featuring agricultural and domestic products, with prizes for best in show.
Mr. Watson earned the title “Father of US Agricultural Fairs” by helping many communities in New England to create and hold their own State and County Fairs. The concept caught on like wildfire. By the late 1800s, most major cities had State Fairs. Fairs included rides, entertainment, horticulture, butter sculpture, technology, livestock, and best of all, recipes and innovative foods.
The Texas population tripled between the 1850s and 1860s which made it a proving grounds for the offerings of the State Fair. The California Gold Rush and the great move West was occurring. Land owners wanted to sell land locally and travelers were in need of livestock, supplies and lightweight food to carry with them on these difficult journeys. These mutual needs created an environment ripe for holding such events and inventions naturally landed at the State Fair.
The Meat Biscuit – invented in 1850 by Gail Borden Jr. – was such an attempt. He wanted to make portable ‘meat glue’ to aid friends who were traveling to California and needed vittles to carry from Texas. Using a large kettle, he boiled down 120 pounds of veal into 10 pounds of extract (today we would call this beef or bone broth), then mixed it with good flour, rolled it, cut it into biscuits and baked it.
The meat biscuit could be eaten as a biscuit or made into a portable soup. According to Borden, “Two pounds of it will supply one man for a week, and fourteen pounds will support him for a month.” He patented the formula and took it to London's Great Exposition in 1851, winning a gold medal. In 1852 Mr. Borden also won a prize for the meat biscuit at the Corpus Christi state fair, but it didn’t catch on as much as his next food invention.
If you remember your great-grandmother's ice box, then you know refrigeration is a very modern invention and fresh products like milk are especially hard to keep fresh. While shopping his meat biscuit to skeptics, in 1853 Borden also created sweetened condensed milk in an attempt to create a shelf stable milk product. The meat biscuit never caught on but the milk did and later became a lifesaver for soldiers during the Civil War. He opened two factories to produce his product, but both ultimately failed. One unfortunately was during the Panic of 1857. But Borden was determined, and it wasn't until the third factory opened in 1864 that his condensed milk, sold under the name Eagle Brand, eventually caught on. This product is still sold 168 years later at supermarkets featuring the Borden name.
In addition to its varietal agricultural offerings, the State Fair continues to flourish as a place for American innovation. And the passion for innovation has benefitted greatly from the prize culture initiated by Elkanah Watson. Recipes, once referred to as “monuments to housewifery” are still created and submitted in order to win blue ribbons and a baking badge of honor with pies, cakes, rolls, breads, cookies, bars, jams, jellies, pickles and more. Many a cookbook has been launched with these blue-ribbon recipes but more importantly, the boom in home cooking across the country has created an American passion for the kitchen as the heart of the home.
Elkanah Watson’s involvement and patriotism brought the fledgling American agricultural communities together to share and learn in such a positive way, it birthed a movement that continues with about 2,000 fairs held around North America today.