DALLAS — Don’t you dare call it a “corn dog.”

“It is a Corny Dog,” said Amber Fletcher, standing outside of the Rustic bar in Dallas.

Amber Fletcher of Fletcher’s Corny Dog stands by their food truck (Spectrum News)

One afternoon, the curb outside the Rustic became the new home of the Fletcher’s Corny Dog as the state fair delicacy went on tour in 2020. With the pandemic shutting down most of the annual event, Fletcher and her family decided to take their corn dogs to locations throughout the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex for pop-up events out of the back of a food truck.

Around here, seeking out a pop-up for a taste of a Corny Dog is pretty understandable.

The Fletcher’s Corny Dog is a bit of a thing of legend in DFW and throughout Texas these days. Amber Fletcher and her brother Aaron Fletcher helm the company today but it’s been running since far before they were born, and building a rabid fan base along the way.

“Corny Dogs started in the year 1942 with my grandfather and his brother,” said Amber Fletcher. “They were performers in Vaudeville in a show at the State Fair of Texas called ‘the Drunkard.’

According to the Fletcher’s official history, which is recounted on its website, Neil and Carl Fletcher were offered a food booth at Fair Park to help expand the cuisine offerings at the State Fair. Unsure of what to make, Amber Fletcher said the brothers decided to try their take on a breaded hot dog dish they’d seen made in Dallas and baked in the shape of an ear of corn. The Fletchers, though, decided to try frying the dish and serving it on a stick instead.

Cooks at Fletcher’s Corny Dog deep fry the Texas treat (Spectrum News)

“It was something people hadn’t seen before,” said Amber Fletcher. “The first year they had them at the State Fair of Texas they literally had to cut them up into bite sized pieces and give them away to people.”

The freebies didn’t have to last long.

The Fletcher’s Corny Dog quickly grew into a favorite at the fair. The lines grew seemingly every year as event celebrities stopping by had to try the Texas treat.

If you look up the history of the corn dog in 2020, various sources place the Fletcher family among a small handful of vendors that popularized the dish in its modern form.

As they grew up in that Texas famous family, Amber and Aaron Fletcher both said they wanted to carry on that Corny Dog tradition.

“My first year, my first fair, I spent in a crib back in the office in our permanent stand down at Fair Park and I’ve been out there every year since,” said Aaron Fletcher.

When their dad, Neil “Skip” Fletcher passed away in 2017, Aaron Fletcher, Amber Fletcher, and a handful of other family members took the reins of the business and have helped expand it with new offerings along the way; new takes on the classic dish.

2020’s pop-up stands and drive-thru versions of the State Fair have been an all new challenge, but the family’s stands keep drawing long lines. Texans, despite everything going on in the world, still seem eager for a Corny Dog fix.

“We love knowing that our fans are always, they’re still wanting it. It’s not just they wanna come to the State Fair for it, ya know, they want Fletchers and we’re grateful for that,” said Aaron Fletcher.

Amber Fletcher said, after the success of their pop-ups this year, they are looking at more ways to keep expanding opportunities for folks to have a Corny Dog in the future.

If you’re still wondering why many seek out the Corny Dog over some other corn dog--well, it’s tough to say. It could be in the recipe, maybe in the way they fry it, or maybe it’s just because it’s about as Texas a treat as you’re gonna find.