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By John Goodner
Scrapple rules!
Scrapple is a savory mush in which cornmeal and flour, often buckwheat flour, are simmered with pork scraps and trimmings, then formed into a loaf. Small scraps of meat left over from butchering, too small to be used or sold elsewhere, were made into scrapple to avoid waste, a Pennsylvania Dutch tradition.
Scrapple is typically made of hog offal, such as the head, particularly the 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.
Commercial scrapple often contains these traditional ingredients, with a distinctive flavor to each brand, though homemade recipes often specify more gentle cuts of pork, with a consequently blander taste. A few manufacturers have introduced beef and turkey varieties, but often color the loaf to retain the traditional coloration derived from the original pork liver base.
History and regional popularity
Scrapple is arguably the first pork food invented in America. The first recipes were created by Dutch colonists who settled near Philadelphia and Chester County, Pennsylvania in the 17th and 18th centuries. The culinary ancestor of scrapple was the Low German dish called Panhas (literally, "pan rabbit"), which was adapted to make use of locally available ingredients.[citation needed]
Scrapple is strongly associated with Philadelphia and neighboring eastern Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Maryland and Delaware. Among the Pennsylvania Dutch and in Appalachia, scrapple is known as pawn haas or pon haus, a term hailing back to the old Dutch dish. It can be found in most supermarkets throughout this region in both fresh and frozen refrigerated cases. It can sometimes be found in cities farther from this area, even as far away as Los Angeles, in frozen form.
XXXX - Dead Sexy
XXX - Sexy
XX - Not Sexy
X - Frigid
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