# scrapple



## treefrog (Mar 18, 2006)

scrapple is a tradition in the middle atlantic states, and has become associated with the "pennsylvania dutch" of several types - mennonite, amish, etc. it is basically a technique for reducing waste when slaughtering a hog, though it works as well with deer, sheep, or other mid-size animals.

the bones with meat scraps, along with the heart, lungs, liver, spleen, pancreas (not the intestines), head, etc are boiled/simmered in a large pot until the meat is falling off the bones. the pot is allowed to cool enough to handle the contents. bones, skin, etc are removed, the remainder is chopped or coarsely ground, and returned to the pot. seasonings are added, including salt, pepper (black or red) to taste, garlic, herbs, etc., and the mixture is brought back to a boil. if it's done right, with the right amount of broth remaining, this is a mushy consistency. this is traditionally thickened with corn meal, though other starchy materials will work as well - hominy grits, kasha, buckwheat groats, rice, quinoa...
this is simmer/stirred as the starch takes up the remaining water, when it is about the consistency of mashed potatoes, it is ladelled out into pans to cool and solidify into a loaf. these loaves are kept refrigerated until they are sliced and fried crispy- usually served as a breakfast food.
this is more a technique rather than a recipe. it is never the same twice, as there are never two identical animals slaughtered, and the spicing/seasoning is variable with the individual cook.
options: rosemary, thyme, sage, fennel seeds (whole or ground), basil, turmeric, cumin, coriander... let your imagination be your guide.


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## RonM (Jan 6, 2008)

When I was young I stirred many pots of scrapple


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## simi-steading (Sep 27, 2012)

Never cared for it.. maybe because I'm not a fan of offal.... I've tried it almost every time I've come across it though.


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## roadless (Sep 9, 2006)

I just tried it for the first time last month at a diner here, the flavor was good but it had a weird texture. 
I was told that it should have been crispier.


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## Sourdough (Dec 28, 2011)

Mommie, What is in this.......??? 

Son, everything but the "OINK" and the "MOoooo".

It's good Mommie, can I have some more......???

Raised dirt poor in back country PA. in the 40' and 50's I think we lived on scrapple. Sliced 1/2" thick and fried crisp each side and put into two slices of "Wonder" bread.

Or made into gravy and served over mashed potatoes or biscuits.

Scrapple for breakfast, lunch and dinner.


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## oneraddad (Jul 20, 2010)

My friend from Pennsylvania would bring some back every time he went home. He'd fry it and we'd eat it on bread, this was in the 80's.


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## roadless (Sep 9, 2006)

I think I liked the taste better when I didn't know what it was.:teehee:


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## light rain (Jan 14, 2013)

Scrapple is a fond memory from zone 7. Thanks for reminding me! I believe I can get some at Woodmans for the holidays. With 2 eggs over easy and a hot cup of tea or coffee it is a really fine breakfast, occasionally... :thumb:

*maybe some grits on the side


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## treefrog (Mar 18, 2006)

even if you're not slaughtering anything this week, it's not hard to make from store-bought items. pork neck bones have a lot of meat on them, a slice or two of liver (pork, beef, calf) along with some grits and seasoning make a pretty good scrapple.


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## TraderBob (Oct 21, 2010)

I make scrapple with hocks and feet. I make headcheese as well using hocks, since they are so plentiful in the store, and cheap.
I grew up eating them, will probably die still eating them, as will my son


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## RonM (Jan 6, 2008)

I love scrapple, grew uup in Sussex County , Delaware on a farm where I plowed and cultivated with a horse, ate a lot of chickens and hog, and would be considered poor or at best, modest...


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## siberian (Aug 23, 2011)

Fried with a couple eggs next to it,,,,,love it


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## Rita (May 13, 2002)

Love, love, love scrapple. Since we don't eat pork I now make mine from chicken. Since chicken is kind of a neutral meat like pork, it takes on the flavorings. Wish it would freeze better. Seems to get watery after freezing.


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## bee (May 12, 2002)

not being fond of something that folks have described to me as "slaughter house floor sweepings", I make a simpler version of scrapple.

buy fatty boney pork and pressure pot with water...remove bones and chop any chunks, return to boil and add yellow cornmeal, cook to thick mush stage and season with salt and butcher cracked black pepper...pour into bread pans and chill..slice and fry

mine turns out yellow not muddy gray because no liver...lol!
And the reason for a fatty pork is that it frys so nice without adding fat to the pan. It is all what you grow up with...now my Dad loved "liver pudding" over boiled potatoes, I had to leave the house for that one!


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## treefrog (Mar 18, 2006)

i add some good soy sauce to mine to get it a light tan-brown. adds an interesting flavor too. if there's an oriental grocery near you, there are some really good soy sauces. "pearl river bridge" mushroom flavored soy sauce beats anything i have ever seen in a mainstream supermarket.


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## Forcast (Apr 15, 2014)

Oh I love it fired hard and crisp with KING syrup manohman


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## bee (May 12, 2002)

Treefrog I had to laugh reading your post...there is nothing as "backwoods American" as scrapple...but to "fix" it, it took Japanese seasoning!! I am going to have to try this one. Just this year I "discovered" a love of stir fry, so much so that I have started freezing small bundles of stir fry meat strips. My seasoning of choice for mine is soy sauce and teriyaki..not traditional but yummy!


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## Bret (Oct 3, 2003)

RonM said:


> I love scrapple, grew uup in Sussex County , Delaware on a farm where I plowed and cultivated with a horse, ate a lot of chickens and hog, and would be considered poor or at best, modest...


 A rich post.


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## MDKatie (Dec 13, 2010)

I love scrapple now that I live on the Eastern Shore of MD, but I never had it growing up. The idea of it sounded nasty, and my first taste of it wasn't impressive. I was expecting the texture to be like sausage, but it wasn't. Now I love it...sliced thinly and cooked until crunchy. Sometimes I'll have it thicker, so it's crunchy on the outside and softer on the inside.


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## RonM (Jan 6, 2008)

I have even eaten it cold, after all it has been cooked, prefer it cooked crisp with about 3 fried eggs...I was surprised reading these posts that it can be made with other than 'regular' pork ingredients..We only made it on "hog killing days". Aside from us my uncle would kill about 5 hogs and make it into sausage for sale..We would butcher about 3 hogs at a time,and I had to keep the fires going, stir the scrapple and stir the lard, had hog killing pots and ladles. You were always tired at the end of this day..


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## Rivmage (Dec 24, 2012)

I've never tried scrapple. We don't have it out west. I did see it once on a menu in Maryland. I don't recall seeing it on the menu in Latrobe, Penn but we most ate at the hotel restaurant.

Scot


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## osbmail (Mar 6, 2014)

I made some a couple weeks ago with pig butcher scraps heart,head ,tongue,skin and any chunks of bones.Cooked with onions and carrots till Meat could come off the bone than Ground any meat chunks and and keep boiling the broth.Than put ground Meat back in broth and added corn meal.Cooked a bit more than pour into loaf pans and let cool.My only regret is not straining the broth better ( I was not sure how good it would be so did not what to spend a lot of time on it).Than next day I unmolded it cut in slices vacuumed sealed and froze.Turns out this stuff is great the kids even love.To cut into one inches chunk roll in flour and fry in 1/2 inch of oil.It is also nice have to pot near by to keep your table clean of scraps.next pig I do am going to try a batch with liver,lungs kidneys and see if I like it.


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## shellmar (Apr 4, 2008)

My son(12yrs.old) absolutley loves scrapple!

He tells me almost every day and sometimes more than once a day, he wants scrapple.:grit: 

We were at the store today and he said he wanted scrapple for Christmas day breakfast. I will have to pick some up at the farmers market for him.

I can just barely tolerate it. The reason being, I used to see my family make it during butchering, and I can't get that big pot of "stuff" out of my mind. That grey coloring is not very eye appealing.

The best way for me to eat it is fried hard, smothered in apple butter. My son has perfected the way he likes it. He frys it to be crispy on the outside, but mushy on the inside. He likes his with maple syrup.


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## osbmail (Mar 6, 2014)

Don't really see how it goes with sweet sauces like maple syrup.I use Tabasco with it.but it seems a lot of people put syrup on it.


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## vicker (Jul 11, 2003)

Liver pudding and scrapple can get confusing, regionally. Some people call something very much like scrapple liver pudding, but they're two different things. Liver pudding has a bit of rice in it and no, to my knowledge, cornmeal or grits. It can look pretty nasty but, mmm hmmm! To see Liver Pudding Google "Lee's Liver Pudding".
You cannot fry liver pudding any more than you can fry banana pudding. You just hear it up in the skillet and slop some on your plate.  

I've always wondered if, in this case, pudding isn't a bastardization of boudin.


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## osbmail (Mar 6, 2014)

I think scrapple, pudding ,boudin,head cheese are depending location.All are composed of scraps that would not always be used.It is just up to you to find what you like to ,how you like them prepared and how you want to serve them up.


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## treefrog (Mar 18, 2006)

vicker said:


> Liver pudding and scrapple can get confusing, regionally. Some people call something very much like scrapple liver pudding, but they're two different things. Liver pudding has a bit of rice in it and no, to my knowledge, cornmeal or grits. It can look pretty nasty but, mmm hmmm! To see Liver Pudding Google "Lee's Liver Pudding".
> You cannot fry liver pudding any more than you can fry banana pudding. You just hear it up in the skillet and slop some on your plate.
> 
> I've always wondered if, in this case, pudding isn't a bastardization of boudin.


there are lots of similar dishes traditional in various cultures. the scots are fond of haggis which is made with sheep giblets and oats. the german american community in cincinati has goetta which is beef scraps, buckwheat, and wheat. it seems each culture solves the problem a little differently. the similarities are greater than the differences.


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## texican (Oct 4, 2003)

We always (have and still do) had an unlimited supply of pork.... growing up, my grandpa would call several old neighbors over, and they'd get the heads and whatever innards they wanted as their share of 'helping' (scraping and gutting). So, we never really had a chance for the 'peasant' fare... We were relatively poor, but never in pork...

Our local river is in flood stage, and my land has a lot of 'hills' merging down into the now flooding river, and there are at least 20 hogs on the place right now...


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## vicker (Jul 11, 2003)

We're flooding here too, Tex. Friend has large tract down on the river. 8 100 pounders in the pen so far this week. We're butchering next weekend. Most of these are Russians. A couple white and spotted.


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## roadless (Sep 9, 2006)

Just saw some scrapple in the coolers at Aldis.
Who knew?


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## osbmail (Mar 6, 2014)

The last batch I made had heart,liver,lungs,tongue,tail,a few other scraps,and a pound of ground pork.It turned out pretty good and not a lot of liver taste like I thought it would have.


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## idahome (Aug 16, 2016)

ive never had it but have a friend who lived back east and loves it recently found a local deli here that offers it looking forward to trying it


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## light rain (Jan 14, 2013)

Make sure you have some good eggs and a cast iron frying pan to cook everything in. Some good ground pepper with it also... Mmmmm...


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## gopher0 (Feb 15, 2013)

Back to Basics book has a great recipe for this ,Iv'e made it several times .


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