Regional Delicacy

Funnel cake and corn dogs, most people can be assured these items will show up at their festivals. Not in my home town. Baltimore is a quirky burgh. I don’t ever remember seeing a corn dog at a festival as a child but I do remember, with extreme fondness, lemon sticks. The Greek festival, the Italian festival, the art festival, the church fundraiser festival, it does not matter, a festival is not complete without a lemon stick.

What is a lemon stick? It is a lemon with a peppermint stick in the middle. That’s it. The purpose it to suck lemon juice through the peppermint straw. Here’s how it goes:

• At first you will be sucking, hard, with little results.
• Next the lemon juice will start to flow through the peppermint straw, this is perfection.
• Squeeze the lemon as needed for more juice.
• There is a 50% chance tragedy will strike. Either the peppermint stick will break in half or just fall on the ground.
• Get another peppermint straw (the second one was always gratis at festivals).
• Continue sucking.
• Lastly the peppermint will have melted in to the lemon. This too is perfection. Squeeze the center of the lemon and suck retrieve any remnants of the peppermint.
• Wash hands.

You can be certain I will be serving these, not cake, on my birthday.

Lemon Sticks - Serves 4

4 large lemons

6 soft peppermint sticks

Cut 1/4 off of the stem side of the lemon. Using a chopstick make a hole in the center of the lemon. Put the peppermint stick in the hole in the center of the lemon. Serve.

Note: I could not find the peppermints locally; I purchased mine online, $3 for a 1 lb. bag.