I MADE IT UP: Festival needs its own snack food

The snack choices at the Virginia Highlands Festival were…well…ho-hum.  I ate my once-annual funnel cake, but I could have gotten it at any other festival.  Vendors offered all the other standard festival food, like bloomin’ onions, and Kettle-Korn, and that curly potato thing.  The Highlands Festival is 60 years old.  If it is ever going to survive, it needs its own snack, something that you can only get at the Highlands Festival and nowhere else.  It needs a snack that is unique, that people will drive hundreds of miles to get.
Whatever it is, you want people to say, “I love going to the Highlands Festival.  I always get a ________.”  When people get home, you want the neighbors to say, “You went to the Highlands Festival? Did you try the ________?”
Here are some ideas:
Squirrel-on-a-Stick.  This would be a favorite with the barbecue set.  Slow roasted on a spit over an open fire, basted with a special barbecue sauce, a Squirrel-on-a Stick would be a perfect snack for a family of four, a little bit for everyone.  Or, if you’re by yourself, you might just try a barbecued squirrel leg.  As with all barbecued food, you’ll need a lot of napkins.
Porque de Terre en Bierre.  Now here’s a tasty specialty that should appeal to the upscale trendies and the visitors from overseas.  Basically, it’s groundhog parts deep fried in Bud Light.  The name, “Porque de terre en bierre,” may be a little long and cumbersome for some people to say.  Might be better to just call them “groundhog nuggets.”
The Squash Smoothie.  At this time of year, squash is so plentiful that you don’t know what to do with it.  With a little sugar and nutmeg, you could make a healthy snack and serve it in an ice cream cone.  “Did you try a Squash Smoothie?” the neighbors will ask.
BambiBurgers.  This is just what it sounds like, but I think we need a more marketable name.  Maybe wrap them in corn meal, deep fry ‘em and call them Deer Dogs?  That’s better. 
The Possum Pita or the Raccoon Wrap.  Strips of meat lightly sautéed with onions, peppers, and tomatoes.  The only problem here is that possums and raccoons are not too plentiful.  But if the snack takes off, you could breed the critters on farms until you had enough to supply the festival crowds. 
Of all of these, I like the Squirrel-on-a-Stick the best.  In fact, I think Squirrel-on-a-Stick could be a nationwide franchise like KFC. 
Carl D. Clarke, Jr. from Abingdon is a weekly columnist for the Washington County News.  He may be reached at