Kentucky State Fair

It may be just the end of August, but the Kentucky State Fair has already come to town. The smell of grease wafting in the air, littered pavement, screaming children. We weren't too tempted by its arrival, until the local news reminded us that fairs also mean animals, lots of animals. And the weather was just too perfect - not humid, low of 64 and hi of 82 - so we went.

Instead of setting up booths, roller coasters and haunted houses in an empty paved lot for just a few weeks, the Kentucky State Fair is a seasonal collaboration of permanent facilities. The Kentucky Exposition Center has over 1.2 million square feet of indoor space, which is boasted as the largest used for any fair in the country. It's an L-shaped cluster of buildings with polished hallways, exhibition spaces of all varieties, an indoor arena, horse barns and a football/baseball stadium out back. Kentucky Kingdom is an amusement park located next door, with a water park, rides and all the junk food you can dream of. These two entities team up to make the Kentucky State Fair.

Visitors buy tickets separately - paying for the fair will get you onto the grounds, into all of the exhibition buildings, but not onto the rides. For us it seemed perfect. Although picturesque, the Kentucky Kingdom side of the street was everything about the fair that we wished to avoid.

There was still a smattering of the junk food stands available in the Exposition Center parking lot.

Above - hamburgers made with fresh donuts. Below - fried desserts like twinkies, oreos and cookie dough.

But these kind of places seemed much less popular than the alternatives available.

Below - ice cream churned with a little John Deere engine.

Many stands offered food from local farms like beef, pork and dairy. The prevalence of such options was a novel idea for me but as Isaac chomped on his steak burger, it started to make sense.

This is probably what fairs originally looked like. A gathering of farmers and producers from all around to share and sell their goods. As we continued exploring the fair, and those 1.2 million square feet of space, this same pattern continued. We've seen animals at the fair, and blue ribbons, but never in this capacity and with such variety.

There were more rabbits than even I care to look at. And more goats, pigeons, chickens, cows, horses, mules, sheep dogs - huge numbers of breeders displaying their wares or prize animals. And these spaces change ever few days, making way for others to come, show off and sell some of their farm animals.

Regarding blue ribbons, the range of categories was beyond what we had ever seen before. There were the familiar garden roses, giant pumpkins and pound cakes. But categories went far beyond that. Blue ribbon bee hives and hay bales, fairy gardens and aquariums.

This blue ribbon gold fish was one of our favorites. He was everything a gold fish should be - chubby, energetic and adorable.

Judges must develop a special eye - for I have no idea how to judge a bunch of hanging tobacco leaves or bunches of the dried stuff.

Honey jars and hay bales - divided by class and type. Wildflower, clover, alfalfa, timothy, on and on the divisions went.

It really was a treat to walk around and see. And there was plenty of the typical flea market stuff too - vendors selling things like hunting knives, bake ware and blankets with sports logos. But overall the fair gave off this feeling of old fashioned local spirit. Buffalo Trace Distillery had a large tent set up with special drinks and bourbon barrel tables and Ford had an exhibit about their local assembly plant complete with 2017 models.

And although we picked a perfectly cool day to visit, I imagine all of that indoor air-conditioned space is really appreciated on a more typical sweltering August day.

Just a few more of our favorite highlights. An endless barn of milk cows, some with hips as high as our heads

The farmers had tents or simple cots set up next to their animals, in the small lot they're calling home for the next couple of days.

Below is the blue ribbon lionhead rabbit - the same kind as our pet rabbit. I can't help but think that our Cookie would have won if she had been there. See for yourself. :)

Below is an English lop - a large rabbit bred to have long ears which drag the ground. 

A horse show - we watched some dressage and carriage pleasure driving.

It was the first time we had ever heard of that portion of competition - "carriage pleasure driving".

We were ready to head home before seeing it all - skipping the horse barns altogether. Our timing seemed pretty good too. On the way back to our car, at a convenient lot across the street which did not cost $8, we strolled past just the beginning of the incoming traffic. It was a fun visit and although we didn't see everything, the endless idling cars made our departure a little easier.

Big Four Bridge

Louisville has a series of parks that connect like beads on a string, curving alongside the Ohio River. On a day which promised a patchwork of scattered showers, we hurried to explore the east end of these riverside parks. The parking lots were ample, nicely designed, with bathrooms you wouldn't mind using and a new feeling about them. If you go to your fair share of parks, then you recognize that these things are worth noting.

We walked along with the river on our right, heading towards the downtown Louisville area.

It's just pretty paved trails, with greenery on both sides. We passed a sparkling new playground, a water park and saw wide green areas. This is the same park system where the large fireworks event in the spring during Derby madness.

There's four bridges that cross the Ohio River here, linking Kentucky to Indiana, connecting Kentuckiana as they say. Two are for cars, one is for trains, and the last is for pedestrians.

It's the bridge shown to the left, known as the Big Four Bridge. Originally a railroad truss bridge finished in 1895, in recent years it was converted entirely into a walkway for feet and bicycles.

The winding ramp leading up to the Big Four Bridge has a steady 5 degree angle, making it handicapped accessible (and I bet really fun for cyclists on the way down).

The west side of the ramp offered a nice view of downtown Louisville with a green foreground.

By the time we walked all the way up the ramp, I had decided that this must be one of the top places locals pick to shoot engagement photos. At least I would if I was from here. It is so picturesque and iconic.

As we walked the span of the bridge, we stopped to read plaques about its history and of course take pictures. Occasionally we heard whooping and cheering from somewhere along the waterfront of the Indiana side.

On lazy weekends, it's become a frequent suggestion. "Should we go to Indiana today?" Because neither of us has ever been, and we know nothing about it, and it is just over the water. Walking along the bridge, we decided that today we would finally go, walk in fact, to Indiana.

As we crossed the halfway point of the bridge, I started sizing up the people around us, trying to determine if they were from Indiana. After so much talk, the neighboring state to the north had begun to feel a bit like a foreign country. Our first impression of Indiana was suitably unexpected - a handful of mennonites on a Sunday outing and this scene.

Below is the view as we descended the Indiana side's ramp. There is a tiny toy skeleton in one of the brick house's windows.

By the time we made it down the ramp, we both agreed that entering Indiana felt surreal, a totally different atmosphere than the other side of the river. It's like we were plopped down in the middle of some ancient, quirky neighborhood.

This is Jeffersonville, the birthplace of Papa John's pizza. We walked along the riverside road, West Riverside Drive, determined to reach the source of the cheering. It was the finish line of some marathon, located out front of a restaurant called Clucker's blasting '70s hits. We had seen runners with numbers pinned to the bellies on the Louisville side too, but hadn't connected the dots.

A little disappointed and a fair amount hot, we decided to head back. The sun had finally burned through and we felt satisfied with our mini adventure into uncharted territory.

A quick pause to marvel at the mysteries of the Indiana side. The strange wall that seems to cut a neighborhood in two, the powerful quiet that blankets the area.

We practiced our selfie skills and then headed back home. We had drank our fill of adventure for the week.

But really, I add this place to my mental list of Louisville gems. The Big Four Bridge seems to have the ideal balance of a perfect park - plenty of fresh air and nice scenery which melds the natural with man-made. One can enjoy some of the city scenes without actually having to get into its traffic.

Cooking Doenjangjigae

We are a bit disappointed with the availability of Korean food in Louisville. Searching online shows a handful of restaurants and asian grocery stores which bit by bit we have been scouting out on weekends. Isaac drives slowly through old, half abandoned strip malls while I squint trying to read the signs and find which one belongs to the restaurant or market. The restaurants haven't tempted us much, all having menus that are two to three times the price of what we paid a few months ago.

But being without Korean food these past months has left our stomachs feeling a little lacking. So this week I finally worked up the courage to try making one of the dishes myself.

I found a well-maintained little grocery store, one of its blacked out windows saying 우리 식품, "our food/grocery". Inside it had all of the Korean ingredients I was missing to make a delicious and much missed dinner.

Doen-jang-jj-gae is one of the essential Korean dishes. This soup has a unique, instantly recognizable smell and unforgettable flavor. For westerners it might be an acquired taste, but with repeated exposure it quickly becomes addicting.

Often it is served at meat restaurants - after you eat your fill of grilled meat, hot stone pots of bubbling doenjangjigae are brought out with cups of rice. And somehow you find room to gulp it all down. So Isaac and I developed a nice system - we would go to a samgyupsal (grilled pork belly) restaurant and order meat for two people and one doenjangjigae. He would eat all of the meat, while I would happily sip my soup.

To the left is a picture I snapped from such a night. Isaac tending to the meat cooking at the small charcoal grill between us, me breathing in the steam from a bubbling pot of doenjangjigae. This is the soup we've been pining for recently.

Even to me it seems kind of pathetic that I've never made this dish - especially considering it's one of the basics of Korean cuisine and that I lived in Korea for almost a year. I was planning on getting a lesson either from my father-in-law or Korean friend, but time ran away before I had the opportunity. I have eaten it enough though, examining each spoonful, sipping the broth and noting its ingredients, to have a good idea of its taste and composition.

So, about those special ingredients that make this soup unforgettable.

Doenjang is a fermented soybean paste, and a foundational taste of the traditional Korean diet. It is all kinds of good-for-you, perhaps most famous for aiding with digestion and being anticarcinogenic.

The unique fishy stock used in many Korean soups and sauces is another must. It can be a little off-putting at first. The first time I tried making it in Korea, I freaked out and asked my neighbor for help. "It smells just like fish food!" Precisely like the little flakes you shook into your goldfish bowl as a child. She calmly told me that the smell was normal. It does have fish in it after all. And as strange as its first impression might be, in the end it blends seamlessly into the smell and taste of many Korean dishes. If its not used, food often tastes a bit bland or incomplete.

The two essential parts of this soup stock are anchovies and a specific kind of seaweed called dashima. Families and restaurants develop their own secret recipes and guard them with pride. As a novice, I'm not going for gold, nor do I want giant bags of fish and leathery seaweed hanging out in my pantry and freezer. Lucky for me, I brought this little helper back with me from Korea.

The Korean writing actually calls this a teabag which cracks me up. This is the world's most disgusting tea bag. But it is also the perfect little pouch of anchovies and seaweed, just the right portion to make soup stock for two.

Nothing unfamiliar about these other ingredients! Here are the veggies I used for making doenjangjigae and a marinade for stir-fried beef.

It seems like there is usually a lot of chopping involved with making Korean food. But once you get used to it, it can be a good thing. Do all of the prep work well ahead of time, and the cooking part can be quite simple!

For my first attempt at doenjangjigae, I took inspiration from two different recipes. One from the popular Korean cooking blogger called Maangchi (found here) and one from a Korean cookbook we bought while living in Korea.

This is actually a cookbook for making quick and simple dishes for kids. I perused several cookbooks but chose this one because it seemed like the perfect introduction to cooking Korean tastes without being too overly complicated. And even though Isaac agreed, it still felt kind of funny to buy a cookbook to feed my husband meals intended for 6-13 year olds.

What I chose to make is a pretty simple version of this soup. I look forward to tweaking it in the future and maybe getting some tips from Isaac's family to make it even more delicious.

After a fair amount of chopping and a few onion tears, I put the fishy tea bag, diced garlic and chunks of onions, zucchini, potato and spicy pepper into a pot with a few cups of water. Brought it to a boil, then added a few spoonfuls of doenjang paste. It's potent stuff, so I was careful not to overdo it.

I turned the heat down and put the lid on for about 15 minutes. Then dropped in chunks of tofu. A few more minutes, drop the green onions in and it's done!

I plopped some rice in my large bowl of doenjangjigae and served Isaac a smaller bowl along with stir fried beef, rice and traditional side dishes I picked up at the Korean grocer.

It tasted great to me but even more savory was Isaac's reaction. I kept silent and sipped my soup, eager to hear from him but not wanting to affect his judgment. A few "mmm!"s later, he asked for more of everything. And that was when I knew that I'd done all right.

Louisville's Normal School a.k.a. Joe Ley's

Recently we walked around East Market Street, a part of downtown Louisville we hadn't seen before. It's that kind of revitalized area with beautiful old brick buildings and storefronts squished together catering to the coffee-sipping, art-buying crowd. Some locals now call it "Nulu". I'm ashamed that I didn't get many good pictures of the area. It was a little too sunny and too warm to ask Isaac to be patient while I took a lot of photos.

A craft beer brewery, trendy restaurants, a tree snug in its very own crochet afghan, a cafe that sells records. Some regular signs that it's an area we wouldn't mind spending some time wandering through.

There was a lot for us to take in, it being our first time, yet one building across the street stood out big time.

Two giant toy soldiers flanked its whimsical and borderline creepy exterior and it had such an imposing presence over the buildings around it, demanding attention. We stood transfixed, and probably wouldn't have crossed the street if it wasn't for the two people entering its front door. So we followed too.

As it turns out, this is the most magical, impressive antique store ever, where memories are coddled and dreams are born - Joe Ley's Antiques. First built in 1890, this building was Louisville's "Normal School" where teachers learned and refined their educational practices, ensuring a "normal" education for students in schools in the area. You can still see what look like wooden letters spelling out "NORMAL SCHOOL" above the green awning.

 Wandering through its three stories (and we only peeked into the attached warehouse), this place felt more like a museum than an antique store. One room is even dedicated to the owner's private collection, which isn't for sale and is displayed beyond a wooden cage preventing us grimy humans from touching it all.

And the organization of this place is astoundingly detailed. Here's the carousel horse section which leads from the original normal school to the warehouse next door.

Here's the creepy old stuff corner - with coffins and "Rosemary's Baby" style baby carriages. It shares a room with musical instruments and sports memorabilia.

These people have a sense of humor too, even if it might be on the macabre side. There's a mannequin in the casket and others scattered throughout the place. Between the mannequins and wide array of taxidermy animals popping up around every corner, this place will keep you on your toes.

Even the pricing system is incredibly detailed (and confusing). The man at the front door gave us this piece of paper and explained that using the code of letters and numbers we can translate the prices of each item. Some simple arithmetic was involved too, like a price might be D-3. Anyways, second nature to him, he made it sound so intuitive. But since we were in sensory overload at the place with sparkling ceilings and stacks of antiques, it went over our heads.

I am totally smitten with this place. It trumps the Mellwood Antiques place I mentioned before. Its atmosphere, its mystique, its content. It felt like walking into a movie, some other world inhabited by countless peoples' treasures. I think I said "wow" a hundred times. We found this place half an hour before closing time on Saturday, which was probably a blessing because it kept us from getting completely lost in this place for the entire day.

Later on that night, neither of us could sleep and we just lay in bed talking. About this place. It has such a unique and magical feeling about it. That's when we researched the history of the building and what little else we could find out about the establishment. Joe Ley was an orphan, and when he bought the Normal School it was a boarded-up, forgotten building. Now it has been transformed into a lively and one-of-a-kind museum. I can't wait to visit it again.

P.S. It, too, has air-conditioning.