LUA - Unexpected symbol near '・

Question

I'm trying to load a Lua script into my project at runtime. However, whenever I try to do so, I receive the following error when loading the file:

Items\food.lua:1: unexpected symbol near '・

The file itself is simple enough, but I can't see the cause of this:

config = {
    itemtype = 2,
    name = "Food",
    basevalue = 1,
    inventorytexture = 0,
    red = 255,
    green = 255,
    blue = 255,
    inventorywidth = 1,
    inventoryheight = 1
}

Here is the code that I am using to run this in C#, in case this has anything to do with it:

// In main initialisation
public void ItemSetup()
{
    itemTemplates.Add(new ItemTemplate("Items\\food.lua"));
}

// constructor for ItemTemplate class
Lua LuaLoader = new Lua();

public ItemTemplate(string filename)
{
    LuaLoader.DoFile(filename); // here is where the error comes up
}

I have tried changing the settings for the file itself, however none of these appear to help. Here are the settings that I have for this file:

Build Action: None
Copy to Output Directory: Copy of newer
Custom Tool: <blank>
Custom Tool Namespace: <blank>
File Name: food.lua
Full Path: [...]\Items\food.lua

Answer 1

Looks like it could be a byte order mark. See: How do I remove the BOM character from my xml file and XML - Data At Root Level is Invalid

I've dealt with it in some XML files before, so I wouldn't be surprised if this is the same issue. As pointed out in some of the linked questions, there are utilities available to remove/avoid them easily as part of your workflow.