I Tried Deep-Fried Ranch Dressing at the Minnesota State Fair, and I’d Order It Again

I love unusual foods and flavor combinations. That means I love food at state fairs, where indulgent treats wait around every corner. I lived in Minnesota for eight years, about 10 minutes away from the fairgrounds. I could visit the Great Minnesota Get Together (as it’s affectionately called) often to try as many crazy concoctions as my stomach would allow! Even now that I live in Wisconsin, I still look for the announcement of new Minnesota State Fair foods in preparation for my annual pilgrimage back to St. Paul.

I knew right away that deep-fried ranch dressing would be controversial—and that I had to try it. Plenty of state fairs are known for deep-frying foods that maybe shouldn’t be, and this was a perfect example. I was sold.

How is deep-fried ranch dressing made?

I had a hard time envisioning how one would fry a dip. However, the creators of this popular item, Lulu’s Public House, solved that problem by using ranch seasoning instead of ranch dressing.

Lulu’s mixed the ranch seasoning with cream cheese and buttermilk to make a more solid and fry-able filling. Then, cooks coated the cream cheese filling with a panko shell, deep-fried each triangle-shaped fritter and dusted it with ranch powder. Each order was served with hot honey sauce for dipping.

What does deep-fried ranch dressing taste like?

LAUREN PAHMEIER/TASTE OF HOME

I expected the deep-fried ranch to have a runny filling, so I braced for a messy first bite. However, I discovered that the filling was not liquidy at all and tasted more like cream cheese and ricotta than ranch. Each fritter was perfectly hot, but not scalding, and you could tell that they were fresh out of the fryer.

The panko breading was sturdy and crunchy and reminded me of a mozzarella stick. There was supposed to be ranch powder on top, but I didn’t get any on my particular order of deep-fried ranch, although I saw other orders come out with it.

Finally, the hot honey sauce for dipping was more sweet than spicy. Unsurprisingly, it attracted a ton of bees.

Is deep-fried ranch good?

Yeah, I’d go for another order of deep-fried ranch. I thought it tasted more like fried cream cheese or ricotta than ranch, so maybe that’s why I enjoyed it as much as I did. That being said, I do like cream cheese wontons!

I was curious about how much flavor the ranch powder would have added to the bites since I didn’t have any on my order. The filling didn’t have an overpowering amount of ranch flavor, so maybe the powder would have tipped the scales.

I will admit that I stopped dipping into the hot honey about halfway through, since I thought the fried ranch didn’t need it. Though I love hot honey on its own, another group of ranch enthusiasts nearby commented that a marinara sauce would have been better, and I agreed.

Bottom line: The deep-fried ranch was a fun item for Lulu’s to offer, since ranch has superfans and super haters. There are people that use ranch for everything and people that love to hate ranch. The polarity is what made this food so popular. I’ll be back next year for more!