Popular South Dakota Foods You Have To Try And Where To Find Them (2024)

FAQs

What foods is South Dakota famous for? ›

Dining, South Dakota-Style

Communities have their own food stories, but in a state where traditions and recipes vary, dishes like Indian fry bread, chislic, tiger meat, walleye, buffalo burgers, lefse and mocha cakes gather people around the table to eat and drink as neighbors.

Chislic: Salted cubes of meat — ranging from mutton to beef to venison to goat — deep fat fried or grilled; served skewered or on toothpicks with a side of crackers or dipping sauces. South Dakota stands at the epicenter of the chislic revolution.

The Scandinavian immigrants brought many food traditions to North Dakota. You might be familiar with foods such as lutefisk, lefse, Swedish meatballs, rømmegrøt, pickled herring, pickled beets, rye bread and a variety of baked goods.

In the spring of 2000, the South Dakota State Legislature even passed a bill declaring kuchen the official dessert of The Mount Rushmore State. Small-town bakeries, especially in the eastern half of the state, commonly serve these tasty treats.

State Drink: Milk (lac vacuum)

Dairy producers are one of the major industries in South Dakota, producing nearly 246 million gallons of milk in 2014 and generating approximately $427 million in sales annually. Milk was adopted as the official state drink in 1986.

If you're going to eat pie from one place in South Dakota, let it be the Purple Pie Place. It's a purple fixture where the bumbleberry pie is the perfect snack before or after visiting Mount Rushmore and Crazy Horse Memorial, just minutes away. To clarify: Bumbleberry is not a real berry.

Our iconic attractions include Mount Rushmore National Memorial, Badlands National Park, the Black Hills and the Missouri River. On top of that, we have abundant state parks, lakes and trails. Beyond that, we have some of the nation's best hunting and fishing. It's the complete package.

The Dakota Sioux tribe hunted wild game and gathered wild fruits and vegetables. The Dakota relied heavily on game that was native to the upper Midwest and the northern Great Plains. This included buffalo, deer, elk, and turkey.

Sioux City's signature dish is loosemeats, also known as a tavern, a Charlie boy, a tastee and a Big T.

What food grows in South Dakota? ›

Agriculture is the number one industry in South Dakota. Farmers and ranchers grow soybeans, field corn, wheat, sunflowers, alfalfa, vegetables and other crops. They also raise beef cattle, dairy cattle, pigs, chickens, turkeys, sheep and more.

Tiger meat is a raw beef dish. It consists of raw ground beef with onion and salt and pepper, often served with rye bread. Some eat it like a dip with crackers. Tiger meat was first introduced in America by German immigrants.

Our iconic attractions include Mount Rushmore National Memorial, Badlands National Park, the Black Hills and the Missouri River. On top of that, we have abundant state parks, lakes and trails. Beyond that, we have some of the nation's best hunting and fishing. It's the complete package.

Food deserts are espe- cially concentrated in the Great Plains region, probably due to its rural dominance. Montana, North Dakota, and South Dakota include the largest land areas labeled as food deserts (Morton and Blanchard 2007).