The Best Signature Food Each U.S. State Has To Offer

They say that before leaving the country to travel the world, you should explore your own country instead. If you’re a foodie like us, you might love the prospect of visiting new places purely to try out the local cuisine. Being such a vast and diverse country, it only makes sense that the United States boasts some of the greatest food in the world. 

If you happen to get a chance to try this delightful dessert, you’d be nuts to pass up the chance. The recipe is over 150 years old and was invented in Texas and perfected by a syrup salesman’s wife. It’s the secret sauce that makes it Alabama-amazing. 

Smoked salmon has been around forever, but it’s obvious to anyone with the fortune to have taken a bite out of this delicious fish that Alaska does it best. It is, after all, one of the state’s largest exports. Everyone wants a taste!

Mayonnaise, grilled onions, pinto beans, and jalapenos on bacon-wrapped sausages in a bun with optional roasted chile peppers. The Mexican influence might be shining through on this hot dog, and it’s a classic in Arizona.

Feeling hungry yet? If not, the smell of these Arkansan chocolate gravy-covered hot biscuits will make your mouth water. This one’s worth the cheat day. It usually comes soaked with syrup, and the result? A fluffy treat that will melt in your mouth.

In recent years avocado toast has become known as the dish millennials prefer to eat every day rather than owning their own homes, but there’s a good reason they’re popular. Spread over toast, salted, and peppered with crushed chili seeds is the perfect way to eat it.

If you saw the title and thought to yourself, “wait, oysters don’t live in the mountains,” you’d be dead right. Colorado’s rocky mountain oysters aren’t oysters at all but sliced up, breaded, and deep-fried bull testicles garnished with spring onions.

Everybody knows about New York’s slice, but not everyone knows about Connecticut’s white clam pie. The northeast specializes in delicate, rich pizzas. The best place to go is a place that’s been open for almost 100 years—Frank Pepe’s in New Haven. 

No, this one isn’t some kind of scallop and apple hybrid. This filling food was brought over by the Scots-Irish and the Pennsylvanian Dutch. It’s a rich and stodgy dish, and it was created with longevity in mind. It’s made with cornmeal, pork, and spices.

Tart and bittersweet, the best key lime pie comes from Florida and is made with Florida’s very own key limes. This dish can be enjoyed at room temperature in which it melts down like a cloud, or when the weather is hot, enjoyed frozen and dipped in chocolate. 

Best enjoyed straight out of the oven, this Georgian dessert puts the peach in peachicious. Peaches are in their prime from May to August, so if you happen to be around between these months, go gobble some cobbler.   

This one might seem a little off the wall, but it makes a great comfort food. Loco moco is made by covering white rice with a beef burger. The burger is drenched in gravy and then topped with a fried egg. It sounds like an odd combination, but it works.

Now we know what you’re thinking—they can’t love potatoes in Idaho that much, can they? Well, yes and no. You see, this isn’t a potato. It’s ice cream rolled in cocoa in disguise. The cream on top is meant to be sour cream, but it’s actually whipped cream. 

To the uninitiated, this probably looks more like cake than a pizza. But this kind of pie has been around since 1943, invented by genius Italian-Americans who craved a chewier crust, chunkier, tangier tomato sauce, and gooier cheese. 

The bun is mostly for holding the meat. In the best tenderloin sandwich places, most of the tenderloin will lend to hang out of the bun. The tenderloin itself is made up of thinly sliced, breaded pork based on the German Wienerschnitzel. 

Iowa’s nutrient-rich soil gives it the best competitive advantage when it comes to growing corn. The best place to pick up a sweet cob of corn? There’s a great farmer’s market down in Des Moines which sells them along with other fresh produce.

By the name, you wouldn’t expect something called “burnt ends” to be that appetizing. But once you get a good sniff and a good look at this dish, you might have a change of mind. These finely diced cubes of meat are also known as “meat candy” to the locals.

As the legend goes, Ruth Booer, inventor of the bourbon ball, was inspired to create the now-iconic candy after overhearing from a dignitary at a social gathering that “the best taste in the world was one bite of her chocolate and a small sip of bourbon.”

When you eat gumbo, you’re in divine company. The meal comprises celery, onions, and green bell peppers—a trinity the locals refer to as the holy spirit— garlic—the pope, and filé or okra powder. This delicious stew is often accompanied by shellfish, chicken, and rice.

Fresh lobster in a roll? You bet! This summer classic is served cold with a toasted bun and a little spurt of mayo. Some people like to mix it up with a few drops of lemon juice or pepper, but the lobster itself is so rich there’s really need to add any more flavor.

The crab meat in Maryland’s crab cakes comes straight out of Chesapeake Bay. Broiled or fried, they taste great well-seasoned with Old Bay herbs and spices. Timbuktu Restaurant in Baltimore is a great place to find the perfect cakes. 

Creamy, warming, and rich, Massachusetts does clam chowder the best. Freshly harvested clams, celery, fat chunks of potato, and onion are what makes this soup so special.

Coney dogs embody indulgence. While Coney Island may technically be in NYC, they were perfected in Detroit. Many Coney Dog joints are named after the place, such as Lafeyette Coney Island, as shown here.

Beer battered, buttery, crispy, and fat with fish, this fry-up is a Minnesota favorite, especially on weekends. There’s pollack, cod, and the official state fish, walleye—the official state fish—to choose from, among other kinds. 

A great way to start the day in Mississippi is by breakfasting with a traditional Mississippi biscuit. A good local biscuit will be flakey and doughy at the same time, but buttery where it counts—all over. They’re eaten with jam, (more) butter, or even gravy. 

Yeah, you read that right. “Gooey butter cake.” Sounds good, right? It’s nothing compared to the taste of the real thing. A word of warning to those of you who count your calories: You may lose count after a few bites—but this cake is seriously worth the cheat day.

This one is more of an ingredient than a dish, but there were so many contestants with huckleberry filling that it would have been impossible to choose from them. Huckleberries are similar to blueberries but more tart and crisp, as well as more purple.

Nebraska might be better known for its Reuben sandwich, but there’s another sizzler that you should try if you drop by the state. You can find this meaty package in several places all over the state—even by drive-by—at Runza Restaurants.

Alright—technically, this one isn’t a specialty, but in the spirit of Las Vegas, which is the unofficial champion of buffet food, why settle when you can win—or eat—them all? If you’re in for the win, visit The Buffet at Wynn to fill up.

Sweet, spicy, cinnamon—these juicy donuts can be picked up in any old grocery or convenience store, but the best way to experience New Hampshire apple cider donuts is to pick your own at Meadow Ledge Farm in Loudon. 

In case you were wondering, no, this taffy isn’t made with saltwater—it’s made with sugar and corn syrup. It comes in every flavor you could ask for. Try Shriver’s Salt Water And Fudge store in Ocean City to pick some up.

As you might have guessed, New Mexico is famous for its Hatch green chili peppers. These peppers aren’t actually green but red. They’re red chilies plucked before they’ve had a chance to ripen.

Versatile, fluffy, and chewy at the same time, New Yorkers came up with the perfect answer to the common sandwich—the bagel. The tough-but-puffy bread perfectly embodies the spirit of NYC living. You can find some of the best at Ess-A-Bagel.

Served as is or between two slices of bread with mayo or special dipping sauce, fried green tomatoes are considered by many to be the ultimate southern comfort food. This tangy, tart appetizer gives a satisfying crunch as you work your way through it.

Hotdish isn’t one set meal—it’s more of a spectrum of dishes. Some might call it a casserole—but try not to repeat that too loudly while you’re anywhere in the state or you know someone is going to get offended. There are some commonalities. 

In Ohio, if you’re ever asked which way you like it—two-way, three-way, four-way, or five-way, chances are you’re at a chili joint like Camp Washington Chilli in Cincinnati. The chili, named after the place, if you couldn’t tell, isn’t like your father’s chili. 

Unless you happen to hate onions, the Oklahoman onion burger is a mouthwatering feast for the eyes and the stomach. It’s made mostly with (you guessed it) caramelized onions instead of chicken, beef, or turkey, but some prefer to eat it with meat as well.

The marionberry is great to eat on its own, but they also make a wonderful filling for pie. A type of blackberry, they are exclusive to Oregon. They actually came about as a collaboration between Oregon State University and the U.S.Department of Agriculture. 

It’s a little-known fact that the original 1930s Philly cheesesteak didn’t actually contain cheese—just beef—but rest assured, today’s sandwiches come loaded with the good stuff: provolone, cheez whiz, or good ol’ American cheese, as well as anything else you’d like.  

This is one for all you clam lovers out there. If you like fresh seafood, you’ll love what they haul in on Rhode Island. In typical American fashion, each clam is overloaded with meat, breadcrumbs, spices, and vegetables before being baked.

If you’re not a fan of getting your hands messy during a meal, well—you may want to bring some napkins along, because messy or not, you don’t want to miss this, especially for summertime. This one’s from Low Country Shrimper in Mauldin. 

This dish is as simple and as humble as they come. It may not come with as much pizazz as some of the other dishes, but it’s delicious nonetheless. It’s a traditional Native American food that’s fluffy and thick to the tongue. 

Be warned—the “hot” in hot chicken isn’t just talking about the temperature. The original and still the best is located in Nashville—a place called Prince’s—and depending on your endurance, you can take the spice levels off the chart.

There’s nothing better than a BBQ down in the Lonestar State. Cooked over pecan or mesquite wood and mixed with tomato sauce or BBQ sauce depending on if you’re in the east or west respectively, you can’t go wrong with either.

This may come as a surprise, but fry sauce didn’t just come out of nowhere. The ketchup and mayo sauce combo came out of Utah.

There are over 1,500 sugarhouses chugging out Vermont’s famous maple syrup—that’s a lot of demand! Americans use up over 2 million gallons of the stuff every year.

If you’ve ever seen those big peanuts out in the park, they’re likely from Virginia. A whopping 15% of all peanuts in the country are grown there, in the southeast part of the state. 

The sweetest cherries in the country come from Washington. They’re named after the state’s (active) volcano, Mount Rainier, and they have a bright red and orange look to match. 

It was originally a humble lunchtime meal for miners working in the hills. While it comes with fancier condiments nowadays, such as cheese or Italian dipping sauce, it remains a fairly simple food.

Given how big the dairy industry is in Wisconsin, it makes sense that their signature dish should involve dairy somehow. Like halloumi, these delectable bites squeak when you bite them.

This ain’t no finger-lickin’ fried chicken we’re talking about. It’s a classic Wyoming dish served crunchy and flattened to perfection with creamy gravy and mashed potatoes.