Last night’s episode of Andrew Zimmern ^[1]’s Bizarre Foods show on The Travel Channel was all about Minnesota ^[2].

He visited Ingebretsen’s ^[3], Olsen Fish Company ^[4], and the annual lutefisk dinner in Cyrus, MN ^[5] (with visiting German polka band).

Of course you can’t talk about MN without talking about the State Fair ^[6] with its elk burgers, cheese curds, stuff on a stick, dairy products, and Marjorie Johnson ^[7] (man, she can talk).

He made the restaurant scene sound pretty good for about 10 seconds, and then he went to the Rail Station ^[8] for a meat raffle. Next up was Heartland ^[9] and Lenny Russo’s locally-sourced, determined-daily menu. I’m going to eat there for the first time next week.

Okay, I stopped watching after that. His next stops were the White Earth Indian Reservation ^[10] and Grand Marais.

The beginning of the show kind of read like any Minnesota 8th grader’s history project (except maybe the meat raffle part). We’re all a little self-conscious about looking like rubes to folks in other states, but I had to admit that he didn’t show anything that wasn’t completely true. You just won’t find me in Cyrus, MN.