As I am traveling around now doing house sitting, I have made it a point to try any foods that are new or unusual to me. Usually a trip to the local grocery store will tell me exactly what those foods are, and Pennsylvania is no exception. Right away, in the breakfast meat section, I found scrapple. Scrapple is an apt name, as it is pretty much made from the "scraps" of the animal. Pork is the most prevalent, but a beef version is also made. Basically, reading from the pork based label, you read ingredients such as pork ears, snouts, and hearts, and I assume similar from the beef type. Those bits are mixed up with spices and cornmeal into a dense loaf. A lady in the local deli told me that the way people eat it, is to slice the loaf into strips, fry them up in a skillet, and eat them covered in syrup.
That made sense to me, considering the cornmeal component of scrapple, so I asked both of the ladies in the deli about how it tastes. Both of them looked at me askance and said "I'm not eating that, but it's on our breakfast buffet on Saturday mornings, if you want to try it!". I had thought about trying it, but didn't want to buy a whole loaf, and I though, having had haggis in the UK, that this couldn't be any worse, though I must say, I liked the haggis.
The history of scrapple comes from the "Pennsylvania Dutch" of the farmlands, who used every bit of the animal after cutting out the more choice portions. There it is also known as "panhaas" or "pan rabbit". Similar to may cultures way of creating an economical dish of fatty meat scraps and grains into a cheap, filling food product, in that sense, it is really no different than any sausage.
A subsequent trip to the store for their weekend breakfast bar, brought me face to face with scrapple. I opted for the beef scrapple, as, while I can do "bits" such as hearts and such, something about "snouts" was more than I could get past. Brought home my scrapple and put together a breakfast of the scrapple, fried eggs potatoes. It smelled good, so I didn't have that to get past, and it looked good.
I tried the first bite plain, just to get a real idea of the taste and texture. It was crispy on the outside and a bit mushy on the inside. There is a definite meat flavor, sort of like a meatloaf flavor. It isn't as highly spiced as typical breakfast sausages, had no weird, chewy bits, and so overall, was good. I think the biggest part is getting by what you are reading on the ingredient list. Again, as I said, the beef version, though not the original, "authentic" type, suited me fine. I just don't think I could get past "pork snouts" no matter what the taste. Afterwards, I did try a bit with syrup, which is a common way to eat scrapple as well, and found it to be pretty tasty too. Anyone who's ever dipped their side of breakfast meat into the pancake syrup will understand that. So, all in all, I'd say to give it a try! Historically these types of foods have always been one of using as much of the animal as possible, which was even more important when times were lean. That tradition tends to be more common in Europe than in America these days, where we disdain the scrap meats of our food animals but fill ourselves with processed foods full of chemical ingredients.
My next foray into local foods will be back in the UK, where I'll be headed next month. Stay tuned.
