Passing by Lapierre Farm on Route 116 in Shelburne during late summer, a driver might spy two acres of corn and assume it's feed for cows, or maybe sweet corn for the Lapierres' roadside farmstand. Both guesses would be wrong. Since 2023, Andy Lapierre, 42, and his family have raised a pretty unusual Vermont crop: popcorn. They started selling their first 3,500-pound harvest a year ago through half a dozen local stores for about $11 a pound. Packaged in a neat kraft paper bag with an oval window revealing white or yellow kernels, Poppin' Charlie's name nods to the precocious idea "man" behind the product. Lapierre grew up on the 330-acre former dairy farm his family has owned for more than a century. One fall day in 2022, he recounted, his then-four-year-old son, Charlie, suggested, "We should try growing popcorn." When he asked Charlie how much of his favorite snack they should grow, his son replied with conviction, "The whole field." It's been well over two decades since the Lapierres have made a living from the farm, but Andy and his father, Claude, still raise hay. They also grow about six acres of pumpkins, mostly jack-o'-lanterns, which the family sells from their seasonal farmstand and through Claussen's Florist, Greenhouse & Perennial Farm in Colchester. Andy's wife, Ali, co-owns that business with her father. Ali was up for the popcorn experiment though not quite as convinced as Charlie of the need to grow two acres of the novel crop. Her husband said he decided to go for it on the grounds that "the bigger the trial, the more likely the success." He acknowledged that the driver was not so much potential income but to "support our son's passion for popcorn and his desire to grow his own." Andy sourced several non-genetically modified popcorn varieties from his seed dealer and was able to use his pumpkin planter to sow them. He borrowed equipment to harvest, dry and then shell the corn after it dried fully on the cob. "It's a lot of handwork that takes a lot of time," the farmer observed, which contributes to a price per pound about double that of non-GMO, Midwest-grown popcorn. Many customers seem OK with paying the premium, said Gary Mashia of Hinesburg's Lantman's Market, who recently placed a reorder. Andy said the family has sold about a third of its inventory, which includes…