Coles County Fair gains homemade cinnamon rolls, fried chicken (2024)

CHARLESTON — Visitors to the Coles County Fair this week will be able to find pronto pups, french fries, shakeups, taffy and other returning favorite foods.

The fair also is hosting two new food vendors as it continues through Sunday — one focused on homemade cinnamon rolls and the other on fresh fried chicken.

Owners Tom and Maggie Craft of Edmonton, Kentucky are rolling dough and baking cinnamon rolls in their Erma's Sweet Rolls food truck, which is located along the carnival midway.

"We make them fresh daily. We take any cinnamon rolls that are left over and make them into bread pudding," Tom Craft said. This food truck also offers eggless cookie dough for snacking, plus iced and hot coffee.

The namesake of the food truck is the late Erma Hershberger, an Oklahoma woman who started her cinnamon roll business in 1978 with a booth at flea markets. Craft said she took her rolls on the road with a food truck starting a few years later.

Craft saidErma's Sweet Rolls went through a few owners over the decades before he and his wife purchased it about 10 years ago, after seeing it for sale at the Covered Bridge Festival in Indiana. The couple had already been selling funnel cakes as a retirement business and were looking to upgrade.

While staffing Erma's at the Illinois State Fair in Springfield, Craft said they were surprised to see how much of a following the cinnamon roll truck had developed there.

"People were coming up and getting photos with Erma's Sweet Rolls," Craft said, noting those taking photos included families who had grown up with the rolls being an annual tradition. "It has a huge history."

Craft said Erma's following includes members of the Coles County Fair board, who extended an invitation to this food truck. Craft said they have timed their stay in Charleston between other bookings for Erma's in Illinois, including at the upcoming Clark County Fair in Marshall.

As natives of Georgetown, Craft said they have enjoyed seeing their children and grandchildren there while bringing Erma's to East Central Illinois. He noted that their granddaughter Charlee Hamand, 13, is helping make cinnamon rolls at the Coles County Fair.

Regarding the fried chicken, the new Moms Club of Southeast Central Illinois chapter in Charleston is cooking up fresh batches daily at their fundraising booth in front of the Merchants Building.

Fairgoers can get their fried chicken legs and wings, or spicy Cajun fries there topped with special recipe sauce made by chapter founderLetoya "Dimplez" Willis. She said her"DimplezSauce" has a lemon pepper flavor with extra heat.

"I like something that is sweet and something that is spicy, too," Willis said.

The Moms Club fried chicken booth debuted Fourth of July week at in Charleston. Will Stevenson said he and his wife were wanting to try something new with the club's booth and feel fortunate that a vendor space opened up at the Coles County Fair.

Stevenson said the other vendors at the fair have been welcoming and supportive of The Moms Club joining them. The club's space is located along a path that connects the carnival and the grandstand.

"We are getting to meet a lot of nice people around here," Stevenson said. "We are getting a lot of good advice from the other vendors. It's a nice experience."

The Charleston Masonic Lodge's fundraising food stand is open at its longtime permanent location next to the grandstand. Fry Guys is operating the permanent food stand across from the fair office. Many other vendors are arranged along the midway.