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Extreme eating has hit the nation's state fairs, where vendors are one-upping the junk food competition with offerings like deep fried meatloaf and English Toffee Fudge Puppies.

America may be in an obesity crisis, but the demand for outrageous foods — cronuts, ramen burgers, Paula Deen-approved donut-hamburger sandwiches — shows no signs of slowing down. In fact, the public's fascination with bigger, greasier and more gargantuan foodstuffs has hit the nation's already-calorie-rich state fairs, those annual expos of Ferris Wheels, flume rides and deep-fried foods. In fact, according to today's Wall Street Journal, the demands of extreme eaters means that state fair vendors are feeling pressure to up their competitive junk food game—turning grassy fairgrounds into the gastronomic equivalents of the Island of Dr. Moreau.

"It's too bad because we lose a bit of heritage and a bit of who we are," Minnesota State Fair Vendor Dennis Larson tells the Journal's Caroline Porter, explaining that he and his colleagues are under constant pressure to create bigger, tastier, and more outrageous foods. "It used to just be cotton candy and caramel apples," vendor Mary Balducci added, echoing what David Foster Wallace, in his 1994 essay "Ticket to the Fair," described as a Bacchanalian food orgy with the sound of deep fryers forming "a grisly sound-carpet all up and down the paths."