Locals agree: Boiled peanuts among ‘musts’ for visitors

“Oh, no. Don’t eat the hulls,” Carolyn Graham said with alarm, as some members of the Bombers, who hail from Fond Du Lac, Wis., tried boiled peanuts for the first time. “Break them open. And sometimes you need to get the juice out of them.”

Graham is among the surrogate moms playing host to the Bombers during the Babe Ruth World Series this week. The host families are spoiling their guests, she said.

And while the peanuts got mixed reviews, most of the team members liked them, quickly deciding to take a bag to the dugout Friday afternoon.

Word about peanuts must have gotten around the ball park. In the space of 30 minutes Friday afternoon at Wages Market in River Falls, Callene Corkan bagged warm boiled peanuts for World Series visitors from California, Missouri, and Wisconsin.

What else have they tried that they don’t eat back home?

“Oh! Those little cinnamon things,” Patrick Young said immediately.

“Sister Schubert’s cinnamon rolls,” Graham interpreted. The company donated cinnamon rolls to each of the host families to serve their guests for breakfast.

“That place, Two Guys Pies,” Hunter Schmitz added, “Calzones.”

Because the visiting teams and their fans from New York, South Alabama, Missouri, California, Wisconsin, Massachusetts, Texas and Washington state will be here for several more days, we asked our readers to suggest dishes they shouldn’t miss. Boiled peanuts was one suggestion. Here are a few others:

• Melissa Dillard Cook – “Chicken fingers at Tabby D’s!”

• Ciji Huckabaa – “Alabama white sauce with onion rings at Larry’s.”

• Tiffany Day – “The blitz, or some people call it house sauce at our local Dairy Queen. Andy is the only one who has this delicious sauce and the western dog sauce if I’m not mistaken!”

• Sadie Crates Pettus – “Cajun grilled shrimp salad at David’s Catfish House.”

• Emily Brooks Crowson – “Fried dill pickles from Hilltop.”

• Rebecca Walters Cleghorn – “Fried dill pickles from Crow’s Nest.”

• Tara Murphree – “I LOVE the brownies and the Italian Crème Cheese Cake” from Dean’s Cake House.

• Sandy Baker – “Fried green tomatoes from David’s”

• Brenda Biggs – “Loaded potato soup bowl” from Steamboat.