I ate my way through the LA County Fair

This is the last weekend of the LA County Fair, so for most of the people who will see this, this will be too late. But after nearly a decade of not going to the fair, after about five years of going every year, the husband and I decided last minute it was time to get back into it, and we spent this last Thursday enjoying one of our favorite pastimes – eating our way through the fair.

Although this post isn’t as timely as I wish it could be, I need a way to justify the damage I did, not speaking in terms of calories, those I consumed guilt-free, but in terms of my wallet. And writing about them is one way I can justify it to myself.

So here we go – here is everything I ate at the 2025 LA County Fair.

Hot Cheetos & Cheese Corn Dog (4/5 Stars) and Cap’N Crunch Raspberry Chicken Sandwich (2/5 Stars)

We started off the day strong, kind of, with a Hot Cheetos and Cheese Corn Dog (yay!) and a Cap’N Crunch Raspberry Chicken Sandwich (meh…).

As the name explains, the first time was a giant corn dog, dipped in nacho cheese, and rolled in Hot Cheeto crumbs. Inside, instead of a traditional hot dog, there was a slightly spicy sausage. The cheese didn’t add much flavor, but worked as an excellent binder to hold the Cheeto crumbs, which also surprisingly didn’t add a lot of flavor, but added a great texture. The batter wasn’t too thick and the sausage was doing all the heavy lifting, but I’m not mad about that. Overall, this corn dog tasted really good and I’d buy it again.

The Cap’N Crunch chicken sandwich on the other end was a letdown. The flavor wasn’t bad, although way too sweet and for some reason, they decided the raspberry sauce inside the sandwich wasn’t enough; they needed to pour it on the bun, making it a very messy and sticky experience. The cereal added a nice crunch, but that was about the only positive thing. The biggest offender of this mediocre sandwich was the chicken. Sad, chewy, flavorless chicken tenders that just didn’t want to stay in the bun (I don’t blame them). Overall, the sandwich didn’t taste bad, but it didn’t taste great either and for the price, I’d definitely not buy it again (nor recommend anyone else give it a try).

Next stop, we grabbed some birria ramen. Strange choice when it’s 85 degrees outside, but it smelled good and I think our thirst attracted us to the broth more than anything else. I was surprised by the amount of meat served with this and although a bit on the basic side and definitely not an item special to the fair (I feel like you see this everywhere), the ramen was flavorful and comforting.

Fruity Pebbles Korean Corn Dog (5/5 Stars)

The hands-down winner of the fair was the Fruity Pebbles Korean corn dog. Now, I’ve never had a Korean corn dog and nothing really explained what I was buying; it just looked interesting. So when I took my first bite, I had no idea what I was biting into.

The Fruity Pebbles Korean corn dog is cheese and a hot dog, dipped in corn batter, covered in what I believe was condensed milk, and then rolled in Fruity Pebbles. Nothing about this sounds right, but trust me, it was so good! The salty cheese and hot dog balanced the sweetness of the condensed milk and the Fruity Pebbles. And like with the Hot Cheetos corn dog earlier, the cereal added a really nice texture.

This item confused the hell out of me, but I’d eat it again, no questions asked.

Deep Fried Snickers (1/5 Stars) and Cheesecake (5/5 Stars)

Deep-fried things. The star of any fair and this time we got a Snickers and a cheesecake.

The Snickers was a surprising disappointment. The oeanuts got chewy and the flavor was just not there. Part of the problem may have been that the Snickers, I believe, are fried in advance and left to sit, which may have added to the disappointing experience.

The cheesecake, on the other hand, was unbelievable! I could look it up, but I’m not going to, but I believe the cheesecake is frozen before it is deep fried, which creates one of my favorite deep fried food experiences of a hot crispy shell, warm creamy immediate interior, and a gradually colder and more solid/frozen center. (Think deep-fried ice cream.) That is exactly what the cheesecake experience was, similar to my classic favorite, the deep-fried Klondike Bar, which wasn’t there this year.

Also, for being a giant chunk of cheesecake, it wasn’t overly sweet; it was honestly quite balanced for a deep-fried dessert.

Pastrami Chili Cheese Fries (3/5 Stars)

There are many different places around the fair where you can get many different kinds of fries, I just think we picked the worst. Nothing tasted bad, nothing tasted great, everything was mediocre.

What I think makes these fries so mediocre is the fact that I know the other types of fries the fair has to offer, and I really wish I had gone with one of the others – something bigger, crispier, cheesier. But these tasted fine.

Candied Bacon Wrapped Pork Belly Bites (2/3 Stars) and Hot Cheetos Roasted Corn (NA)

The pork belly bites at nearly $20 for five pieces were one of my biggest regrets of the day. Way too much for so little food. Way too sweet, I expected more of a sweet and salty experience, but was met with what simply tasted like maple syrup. And the bacon took away from what could have been well-rendered pork belly.

I ate them because I bought them, but I was not happy.

My husband got the Hot Cheetos roasted corn, which I didn’t try, but I will say it was also a bit of a ripoff, considering only half the corn was actually coated in Hot Cheetos.

Cherry Dipped Vanilla Soft Serve Cone (4/5 Stars)

Now, there was nothing special about this ice cream cone. I will admit I wanted it for pure comfort and nostalgia.

I spent a summer working at DQ and fell in love with cherry Dilly bars. There aren’t a lot of DQs around me now, and when I saw the cherry dipped cones, I couldn’t resist. It wasn’t anything special, but it was exactly what I wanted.

Meatball and Mozzarella Corn Dog (1/5 Stars)

And we ended the night on a big disappointment.

I hadn’t heard a lot about the food being offered this fair season, so I went in basically blind. While there, I did do a quick search just to see if there were any must-tries and this came up over and over again, so I tried it…And I wish I didn’t.

This is, as the name suggests, meatballs and chunks of mozzarella dipped in corn batter and deep-fried. There wasn’t enough cheese in my opinion, the meatball wasn’t very flavorful and the corn batter was grainy. It wasn’t a good experience.