Summer in the Midwest has exactly one setting: outside, loud and fed. From massive music festivals to the gloriously specific, the region's event calendar this time of year is a reminder that Midwesterners will find any reason to close a street and set up a tent. Chicago's Lollapalooza kicks off August 1 in Grant Park, one of the biggest music festivals in the country and a proper send-off to summer on the lakefront. Chicago's Taste of Chicago remains one of the largest food festivals in the world, while the city's neighborhood street fest circuit—from Wicker Park Fest to Roscoe Village Burger fest—are in high demand. Without fail, there’s a festival happening in the city of Chicago every weekend through Labor Day. Detroit's Festival of Books draws readers from across the state and beyond for the biggest book festival in Michigan, and Cleveland's Ingenuity Fest blends art, technology and live performance into one of the more unexpected summer events in the region. Minneapolis delivers the beloved Minnesota State Fair, which isn't a festival so much as a way of life in late August. Then there's the niche stuff, which is where the Midwest really shines. Pittsburgh hosts an annual Pickle Festival that draws thousands of people who are genuinely, enthusiastically there for the pickles. The Pierogi Fest in Whiting, Indiana—just outside Chicago—has been celebrating the dumpling since 1997 and regularly draws hundreds of thousands of visitors to a town of about 4,000 people. The Midwest doesn't do festival season halfway. It does it with a side of something fried and a long line.

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