Wednesday - January 18, 2012

Better Than Bacon

To my complete amazement, scrapple is not a universal American food. The king of all conglomerated pork products is really only available here in the mid-Atlantic states and their close neighbors. News to me. So if you don’t know, scrapple is a mix of flour, spices, and everything that’s left over on the pig once the butcher has done his duty. Everything except the squeal, and that’s what scrapple is all about. Back in the day scrapple was invented by German immigrants in the Pennsylvania Dutch area. It’s scrapings, boiled up with flour to form a mush. If you’re English, think pudding. Europeans - think pork polenta. It doesn’t go in a skin like a sausage, it gets molded into blocks and frozen. Then you get some, thaw it, and take 1/2” slices and fry them. And a good scrapple is the best thing in the world for breakfast with eggs. The problem is finding a good scrapple.

Scrapple is typically made of hog offal, such as the head, heart, liver, and other scraps, which are boiled with any bones attached (often the entire head), to make a broth. Once cooked, bones and fat are discarded, the meat is reserved, and (dry) cornmeal is boiled in the broth to make a mush. The meat, finely minced, is returned, and seasonings, typically sage, thyme, savory, and others are added. The mush is cast into loaves, and allowed to cool thoroughly until gelled. The proportions and seasoning are very much a matter of the region and the cook’s taste.

My grocery store carries the Parks brand once in a blue moon, but the Wal-mart next door seems to be stocking both the Rapa and the Habbersett brands, both for about $2.89 per 1lb package. I had scrapple all the time as a child, so I had a clear memory of how it should taste. I tried the Parks product a couple years ago. Epic. Fail. I can’t give you any details, but it was just wrong. It wasn’t spoiled, but it tasted so bad to me that I threw the rest of it away.

I got a loaf of Habbersett’s last week, and it was perfection. Scrapple is heavily spiced stuff, so if you find you need to add salt and pepper to yours to give it some flavor you’ve got the wrong scrapple. The Habbersett scrapple is loaded with black pepper. Loaded. It also has a light, meaty taste that let’s you know you are enjoying some kind of fried pork product. Habbersett’s is a genuine Penn Dutch product, made right over yonder down across the Delaware River in Amish country.

This week I tried the Rapa product. I hear that the Rapa company is owned by the Jones Farm sausage company. Jones Farm does a great job with their breakfast sausages, and they have their own brand of scrapple which I don’t think I’ve ever tried. I ate half the brick of Rapa yesterday, and I had the other half for lunch today, just to be sure. Not the winner. Sorry Rapa minions. It may be the ingredients. Rapa scrapple is much higher in Vitamin A and iron than Habbersett, being made from (pork stock, pork livers, pork fat, pork snouts, corn meal, pork hearts, wheat flour, salt, and spices) rather than (pork stock, pork, pork skins, corn meal, wheat flour, pork hearts, pork livers, pork tongues, salt, and spices), but it has a duskier, duller flavor. Perhaps this is because of the over abundance of liver, perhaps it’s because of the under use of spices. But it isn’t piquant; it doesn’t sparkle on your taste buds.

The Hatfield company also makes scrapple, although I’ve never seen any. And if I go visit the in-laws out in PA and give them a heads-up, they say they can get some locally made scrapple that beats all the store brands hands down. That’s a challenge I’d like to take up, and I’ll be there with my brick of Habbersett’s, ready to fry.

And yes, with fried or scrambled eggs and toast, it is better than bacon. For lunch, a SLT beats a BLT every time. But bacon is more widely useful, and has it’s own great taste.

More scrapple links:
http://madashellliberal.blogspot.com/2009/05/ode-to-scrapple.html
http://davescupboard.blogspot.com/2008/08/in-praise-of-scrapple.html

PS - a bit of searching has shown me that I can pick up the Hatfield brand down in Flemington, and that it costs a third less than what the others cost. Meat product, $1.79 per pound. Some reviews say it’s pretty terrible though.
PPS - Dave says Jones Farm owns Habbersett too. Perish the thought!

Posted by Drew458     on 01/18/2012 at 04:09 PM   
Filed Under: • Fine-Dining •  
• Comments (12) • Trackbacks(0)  Permalink •  

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