Carnival Food

I love equipment that comes from carnivals. The machines are used to make fast food, but instead of using artificial flavors, I use real flavors. I make a cotton candy with cranberry juice that I mix with maple sugar. After the cotton candy machine, I bought a slush machine; during raspberry season, we did a margarita with it. When I was a kid, Cracker Jack was one of the best sweets I ever had. Now I have a pot that they call a Retro Kettle, and I make caramel corn with maple syrup. I also loved eating snow cones when I was young; now, at the sugar shack I bought in Quebec, I put real snow into a paper cone, add maple syrup cooked to 100 degrees Celsius, and top it with lemon juice and zest. Halfway through eating it, I drop a shot of vodka into the snow cone and finish drinking the snow. It's wonderful. —Martin Picard, Au Pied de Cochon, Montreal