Food Vendors Prepare For Health Inspections At Tulsa State Fair

Before everyone indulges in funnel cakes, corn dogs and everything fried later this week at the Tulsa State Fair, food vendors have to go through health inspections. This year there are more than 200 food booths at the Tulsa State Fair.

After traveling from all over the country, vendors are cleaning up before inspections start on Tuesday.

From Osage Skynews 6, it seems the only thing missing ahead of the Tulsa State Fair is the people, looking for a thrill from a ride or something fried. But on the ground it’s clear there is still a lot of work to do.

"Come on in, right in here! Right here we got our lemon squeezer out here for fresh sqeezed lemonade shakeups. Right here we have our cheese machine for hot zesty nachos. Right here we have our corn dog cooker where we cook our corn dogs and everything,” Billy Fickling with McKinney’s Food Service said.

Fickling said every year at the Tulsa State Fair, mustard is the most popular condiment for corn dogs. "Everybody in Oklahoma loves mustard,” he said.

AMY: "What about other places you go to?"

BILLY: "Well, the further north, like Wisconsin, is ketchup. The further south is mustard. You get over Louisiana, Houston, it's gotta be mayonnaise.”

But no matter the condiment, things have got to be clean. Fickling traveled 800 miles from Illinois to be here.

"Going up and down the road, it gets dust and everything. And like I say, we try to keep it just as clean as can be,” he said.

"We just finished the Kansas State Fair. So we didn't have too far to travel this time,” Matt Hall with “Chicken City” said.

At Chicken City, a new fair food makes its debut this year: the "OMG Chicken Sandwich."

"A Frosted Flakes coated chicken, on a glazed donut, and it's topped with bacon and maple syrup,” Hall said.

But before serving that sweet and savory sandwich, Hall will work to make his trailer spotless.

"Health inspections startin’ tomorrow. And Wednesday, making sure everything is good to go for open on Thursday. so we just gotta get the inside as clean as we got the outside,” he said.

The Tulsa Health Department said inspections go beyond just the next few days; inspectors will be putting in almost 500 hours throughout the "11 Days of Awesome."