America, has it really come to this?

The Annual Big Tex Choice Awards competition at the Texas state fair taking place later this month has inspired a slew of heart-stopping recipes, including Deep Fried Beer. The Digital Journal describes the concoction as beer-filled pretzel dough that is cooked in grease, just long enough to fry the dough but not long enough to remove the alcohol from the beer (about 20 seconds).

The creator of this heart-stopper, Mark Zable, said he’s spent three years trying to perfect the recipe. He seems to be pleased with his efforts. According to the Telegraph, he says “it tastes like you took a bite of hot pretzel dough and then took a drink of beer.”

Deep fried beer is one of the finalists for the prize, along with fried caviar, fried potato pie, deep fried frozen margarita, fried lemonade and fried chocolate.

Perhaps someone should remind these contestants that the same argument against extreme genetic engineering can apply to frying. Just because you can do something (in this case, fry already perfectly delicious fare), doesn’t mean you should.

UPDATED: NewsFeed has been informed that the Annual Big Tex Choice Awards have come and gone and deep fried beer lost. Which is kind of a relief. Except when you consider that the winner was deep fried frito pie.