The Cronut Burger was far too beautiful for this world, pulled from the menu of the Canadian National Exhibition after its maple bacon jam topping sickened dozens of people last week. But that doesn’t mean the proud tradition of carnival stunt-food is over—here are some items still readily available for purchase.
Lamb Pizza: These sweaty fistfuls of mozzarella were pounded into submission and unforgivingly stuffed with shredded mushrooms, onion rings and tomato gravy, wrapped in a healthy sheet of prize-grade wool, double deep-fried to perfection, and served on the end of the bread stick of your choice.
Pork Soda: Oppressively sweet ice cream-infused lemonade—squeezed fresh from many real lemon parts—enriched until unrecognizable with drippings from the pan-fried faces of only the very handsomest pig specimens. Sold exclusively by the yard.
Brown Pudding: The rumors are true! This silky smooth 100 per cent beef dessert literally fell into our laps, tenderized by getting these milk chocolate-fed cows drunk enough to let us push them out of an airplane just shy of cruising altitude. That’s the buttery texture of 15,000 bone-shattering feet you’re tasting.
The Scrimbit: The trendy culinary cachet of a Cronut enhanced by the easy-to-eat size advantage of a Timbit with the added textural experience of these shrimp tails we found.
Cutie Pie: Dog bones marinated in Pepsi until tender and translucent, ground and mulched into a flakey store-bought crust and firmly massaged down your throat with what we can only assume is a bindlestiff’s carryin’ pole.
Holy Guacamole!: Twelve slices of succulent, dubiously cured pancetta-style bacon, each separated by a hearty slathering of seven-layer dip and stacked high atop a chocolate-dipped waffle cone, served with as many maraschino cherries as you can fit in your mouth from the complimentary fruit hutch while your “guarchitect” assembles your snack.
Autoerotic Gyros: Whoops, they just shut this one down, too.
Yoga Berry Twist: Hey, all you “health nuts” out there, this two-liter artisanal yogurt pail has a “sweet surprise” waiting for you on the bottom! (Spoiler alert: It’s a full cob of grilled corn fortified by an upsettingly viscous glaze of zesty chili-lime butter. Did somebody say “gluten-free”??)
Prison Poppers: If we didn’t tell you, we bet you’d never guess that these jalapeños were grown in toilets all across this country’s great and ever-expanding system of correctional institutions. Stuffed to the brim with cubes of surprisingly fibrous venison, surplus cheese and just a single scorpion, these tear-battered anger-puffs won’t make it past sundown (or should we say “lights out”?).
Grandpa’s Beard: To call this Appalachian-style tooth-juice “rare” would be an understatement, and to tell you exactly whose teeth those were would violate many labour laws and the majority of this country’s treaties. Order it by anything but the grip (“Gimme a grip of Grandpa’s Beard”) at your own risk—Grandpa is technically in international waters at all times and thus out of our jurisdiction, we cannot help you.
Pile O’Centa: Sorry.
Corn Dogs: Almost entirely guinea pig.
Pinkled Eggs: Wait a minute, am I in Manila or McSorley’s? We take half a dozen boiled duck embryos, submerge them in the maximum volume of vinegar, beets and garlic allowed by the nanny state, then hide them in a freshly spun bag of delicious cotton candy that your kids will … probably find. Your kids are pretty bright, aren’t they? They’ll probably find them.
