Monster Ears!

Around here the big event in October is the Fall Festival. The city closes off several blocks of one street in order to accommodate carnival rides and games, stages for amateur performances, and tons of booths with all sorts of food.

The booths are owned by non-profit or not-for-profit groups. Our Scout Troop owns one of the booths. Every year the Scouts along with the Young Women in our ward bring the booth to life in order to make money to fund their activities for the coming year. This is, of course, during school so the parents get to join in the fun too! The festival runs all day from Monday through Saturday. The adults man the booth during school hours and then the young men and women (age 12 and over) fill the slots in the evening and on Saturday. It is a lot of fun and a great fundraiser for our youth.

This food at the festival is not just any kind food - it's a little weird. For example, you can get alligator jerky, brain sandwiches, deep fried Twinkies, Snickers, or Oreos, frog legs, chocolate covered crickets, and the list goes on. Sounds good, right!?! Our booth is no different. We sell Monster Ears. They are a delicious! Basically it is sweet bread dough deep fried and then dipped (actually smothered) in a secret sugary cinnamon syrup. Many years ago a gentlemen in our ward started the Monster Ears booth and then he gave it to the Scout Troop to use. Since it started it has become a Fall Festival favorite! People tells us that they come to the festival just to get a Monster Ear!

Yesterday, it was my turn to help at the booth. I got to work with some fun ladies from my ward. We had a lot of fun! Almost everything is done by hand in the booth. The only thing that isn't is the syrup (can't risk the recipe being stolen right!). One person gets to the booth early to start making the dough. When the dough has risen it is passed off to the next person who shapes the dough into balls. Then the balls go through a roller then into the deep fryer. Once they come out of the deep fryer they are dipped in the syrup several times. Then they are ready to be eaten! My job was dough baller. I had to weigh each ball to make sure it was the right size and then systematically set the balls on a sheet to be rolled. It's tough work, but somebody has to do it!!

Going to the Fall Festival is always an adventure. If you like to people watch, this is the place for you. The first time I worked the booth I got to see the dog parade. I was amazed by all of the costumes on the dogs and their owners. Some dogs were totally decked out and yet others were totally normal. It was a very interesting mix. You see all walks of life at the festival. It's fun to talk to the people that come to the booth and find out a little about them. The people are always happy and polite.

Before I left the booth yesterday I had to take home some Monster Ears for the boys. They all requested that I bring them one for themselves. No way, the Monster Ears are huge! I brought home two for the boys. They were all very happy to gobble them right up! What a fun tradition. I can't wait till next year when Tanner gets to work the booth with us!