Over at Flak Magazine, I’ve written an extremely timely review of an extremely strange food: hotdish on a stick. It’s a fair food that’s been hyped to the point of being video-blogged.
For those unhappy few among us not originally from the Upper Midwest, hotdish is a casserole-like food closely associated with the cultural core of what it means to be Minnesotan; its primary unifying agent, cream of mushroom soup, is known colloquially as “the Lutheran binder.”
While hotdish is primarily a cold-weather favorite (read: roughly half the year) it emerges in its “on-a-stick” incarnation during the Great Minnesota Get Together (also known as the Minnesota State Fair). Minnesotans will have to hustle to get their mitts on this starchy rod of meat-n-potato stuffed goodness; the get-together ends on Labor Day.
Yes, but what is it? What does it look like?
I have not yet had the opportunity to taste this magnificent invention, but I have read that it consists of alternating meatballs and tater tots, battered and deep-fried, and comes with a cram of mushroom dipping sauce. Genius!
Here’s a discussion of hotdish and regional differences.
http://www.chowhound.com/topics/show/296834
and the before and after baking photos
http://static.flickr.com/96/231559507_ed99a30e2f.jpg?v=0