I love the fair. Who doesn't, really? Any excuse to throw all of my dietary morals out the window and indulge in deep fried on-a-stick deliciousness? I'm so in.

Due to some rather unique circumstances, I've had the opportunity to go to the fair twice so far this year, and will likely make it a third time over the weekend. So here is my assessment of trip one - and the "porkabella".

I had heard via twitter (@okstatefair) that the "porkabella" was making an appearance at the fair this year and I was immediately intrigued. A skewer of gouda-stuffed, bacon-wrapped mushrooms. I know, I know...its not deep fried. But that's ok - this was trip #1 to the fair and I needed to slowly get my stomach adjusted to the debauchery that went down in my second fair trip (post coming soon.)

I went looking for it, and after some intense searching, I found it. It's at the same place that has the chocolate-covered bacon. My first thought was that there weren't any prices on the menu board, so I knew it was going to be pricey. But I wasn't expecting THIRTEEN DOLLARS! WHAT?!

I threw caution into the wind and bought it anyways, and was pleasantly surprised that it came with both fries and some pita chips with hummus. I was feeling a little bit better knowing that I spent $13 on a full meal, rather than just a snack of some kind. I felt even better when the skewer arrived - it was stuffed from tip to tip with bacon-wrapped mushrooms. The portion size on this made it worth the $13.

After a failed attempt (read: getting it all over myself) at trying to eat and walk at the same time, I quickly discovered that this was a sit-down meal. So I found some bleachers to chow down. Overall, the porkabella was delicious, perfect blend of savory / salty, with a creamy nugget of cheese in the middle. The hardest part of this meal was actually trying to eat it. It's definitely a sit-down, two-hander. It is a little hard to explain, but the bacon wasn't individually wrapped around each mushroom, it was wrapped around the skewer of mushrooms which made it difficult to just pull one off and pop it in your mouth. Also, the bacon wasn't a crispy as I would have liked - but I'm a little picky about that, so maybe it would have been fine to someone else.

All in all, if you are looking to find one thing at the fair to eat (versus a six course meal as indicated in Fair Food Part II) - the porkabella would be a good choice. The portion size was plentiful, and the flavor was good. I left feeling satisfied, but also a little sad that I didn't have room for a deep fried peanut butter oreo cotton candy apple on a stick (or whatever). I definitely made up for it in trip #2...stay tuned.