I’d like to start by letting everyone know that my lard situation has improved since last week. I have procured a metal container that won’t bleed steaming hot grease onto Eric’s arm anymore (His scar is less red now but still smells like bacon). So please look forward to future recipes involving my delicious, special reserve of piggy fat. I’m also looking into purchasing a 5-gallon bucket of cow fat too. As you can tell, big things are happening here at Secret Menu HQ.

Now that we’ve got the chit chat out of the way, let’s talk about how I destroyed my digestive system this week. The higher-ups here at the Collegian offices decided that since the fair was in town, I could benefit my readers by taking on the challenge of creating a fair themed Secret Menu item. I gladly obliged. I knew there was plenty of culinary creativity to be culled out of the deep fat friers of the Ashland County fair. So, along with my small band of Collegian staff helpers, I left on an adventure. An adventure that could only end with healthy doses of trans fats and sugars.

Upon arriving at the fairgrounds, I realized that I had my work cut out for me. There were so many options to choose from. There was steak-on-a-stick, fried pickles, pork BBQ, funnel cakes, and corn dogs, to name just a few. I made sure to do a thorough scan of the full array of possibilities and became incredibly disappointed when I realized that nobody was selling fried butter. What kind of a fair was this? Whatever. I carried on, like a wayward son.

It was at this point that, from the corner of my eye, I spotted a vendor selling the next best thing: fried Swiss cheese on a stick. This would become the focal point of my dastardly dish. Next I approached a gentleman and asked him for his 3 finest French waffles. In case you’ve never seen a French waffle before (I was unfamiliar with the food), it looks like Rick Moranis shot a Honeycomb cereal piece with the ray gun from “Honey, I Blew Up the Kid” and then covered it with cocaine, and it tastes delicious. To bring everything together, I purchased the most iconic of all fair fare: the elephant ear. It was made fresh on the spot by a young man who was nice enough to show me the ingredient list, including the oil with which he was frying the food. …Not that knowing would affect my decision – I just had to know.

Sitting down with the spoils of my adventure, I quickly assembled what I will now dub the “Tilt-A-Wrap.” I crumbled the French waffles onto the cinnamon and powered sugar-laden elephant ear and then rolled up the deep-fried Swiss cheese stick within it all. I now had a cheesy, sugary, hydrogenated burrito on a stick. It was go time.

My mouth didn’t know what hit it. It was like a deep-fried donut with a piquant, cheesy cream filling, but with a satisfying crunch brought on by the French waffles. Simply put, it was amazing. I was immediately glad that I decided to add the optional chocolate and strawberry syrup to my elephant ear. Together, they took the wrap to the next level.

Toward the end, I could tell that the dense cheese was beginning to take its toll but I told my stomach to shut up and do its job, and it quietly submitted. I finished the Tilt-A-Wrap with appetite to spare, so I went off to another vendor and, in the spirit of Autumn, consumed a scoop of pumpkin ice cream. My mission was complete.

I’d like to send a shout-out to my pancreas, without whom, I would be a very dead man. May you secrete insulin vigilantly for all of our days together.