{"id":845795,"date":"2026-09-13T00:28:21","date_gmt":"2026-09-13T00:28:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/845795\/"},"modified":"2026-09-13T00:28:21","modified_gmt":"2026-09-13T00:28:21","slug":"serving-up-squirrels-world-champion-squirrel-cookoff","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/845795\/","title":{"rendered":"Serving up squirrels: World Champion Squirrel Cookoff"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Serving up squirrels: World Champion Squirrel Cookoff<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.4029tv.com\/news-team\/0c4bf464-6431-4474-9ae7-1cfd3a00afe9\" aria-label=\"Valerie Zhang profile page\" class=\"css-15eikfp\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/0c4bf464-6431-4474-9ae7-1cfd3a00afe9_1701747872.file.png\" width=\"48\" height=\"48\" alt=\"Valerie Zhang\" loading=\"lazy\"\/><\/a>SPRINGDALE, Ark. \u2014<\/p>\n<p data-node-id=\"0\">The World Champion Squirrel Cookoff returned with squirrel stovetop, squirrel ice cream, and other creative dishes using the unexpected protein. Cooking began at 9 a.m. on Saturday Sep. 12. While many dishes highlighted squirrel meat, there was also rabbit, alligator, and wild boar. <\/p>\n<p data-node-id=\"1\">Teams handed out food and samples from their tents. <\/p>\n<p data-node-id=\"2\">All dishes part of the contest must have used wild-harvested squirrels as their base protein. <\/p>\n<p><img src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/6b50d20d-f6d3-447e-bd5f-8095e9c6695f.png\" alt=\"Image no longer available\" width=\"100%\" height=\"auto\" decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" draggable=\"true\" class=\"css-fphibt\"\/><img src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/6b50d20d-f6d3-447e-bd5f-8095e9c6695f.png\" alt=\"Image no longer available\" width=\"100%\" height=\"auto\" decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"css-hr9vxw\"\/><\/p>\n<p data-node-id=\"4\">The Arkansas Game and Fish Commission&#8217;s K-9 Unit also had a demonstration to show how wardens track down poachers as well as assisting law enforcement agencies in search-and-rescue operations. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Serving up squirrels: World Champion Squirrel Cookoff SPRINGDALE, Ark. \u2014 The World Champion Squirrel Cookoff returned with squirrel&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":845796,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[51],"tags":[6619,357885,32004,357887,357884,299,158653,136445,357888,79,53911,1599,141672,357886,84795,201,357883],"class_list":["post-845795","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wildlife","tag-alligator","tag-arkansas-game","tag-cooking","tag-dish-part","tag-fish-commission","tag-food","tag-rabbit","tag-sample","tag-saturday-sep","tag-science","tag-squirrel","tag-team","tag-tent","tag-unexpected-protein","tag-wild-boar","tag-wildlife","tag-world-champion-squirrel-cookoff"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/845795","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=845795"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/845795\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/845796"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=845795"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=845795"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=845795"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}