Offal

[Suzanne F]

eGullet members have a mostly loving relationship with offal. You've already discussed tripe, with a side trip to spleen. What are some of your other favorite stops along the offal high- (or maybe low-) way?

[Mister_Cutlets]

It's offal good, if you ask me! Too gnarly to eat and too good to throw away, offal is one of my favorite things -- once it's been turned into a refined product. There are a thousand and one ways to transform offal, or garbage, into tasty dishes. Head cheese, blood sausage, testa, scrapple, souse, pudd'n cookie -- the list goes on and on. If I had to pick a single one, it would most certainly be scrapple. You have to love any food whose recipe begins, "take a stiff wire brush and clean the snout thoroughly." (as an old cookbook of mine does.) Pennsylvania is really the nation's scrapital; Amish country in particular is a paradise for the stuff. But you can get good scrapple in New York too.

My favorite brand of store-bought scrapple has always been habbersett: it has the richest, most livery taste, and an extra depth from the added broth, heart, and head-meat. Traditionally, scrapple is meant to be cooked up in a great vat and then allowed to cool in bread pans. You slice it up and fry it in a pan, where it releases its own fat, and gives up some of its moisture as it cooks, concentrating its flavor. I cut my scrapple very thin, let it cook until it gets very dry and crispy, and then eat it straight up, or as a sandwich on untoasted wonder bread. The best (and practically the only) restaurant scrapple I've had in New York was at Pan Pan restaurant on Lenox Avenue and 135th street. It comes in a crunchy cube and is lighter than air.

Mr. Cutlets

[Pan]

What all is in scrapple? Liver, heart, head meat, what else?

Thanks for participating. It's been fun to read your contributions!

[Suzanne F]

Not the head meat so much -- you need that for headcheese or brawn. But liver, kidneys, heart, and whatever other scraps you've got, plus cornmeal, salt and pepper, and maybe a little sage or thyme. Kinda like cornmeal mush with meat mixed in. Truly a great dish -- crunchy on the outside, soft on the inside, and porky all the way through.

[Jim Dixon]

If I lived there I would want this on my license plate:

Pennsylvania: the nation's scrapital

Jim

[v_wang]

i don't know exactly what counts as "offal," but i would like to profess my love for bone marrow. mostly i have it in my aunts' stews - that's me, picking through for the round bones and slurping happily - but last weekend i had it poached in a schmancy french restaurant with a little tomato and green onion on top, sided by a pissaladiere with sliced avocado, and it was indeed delightful.

best part it, when no one else wants it, more for me.

[Foodie_Penguin]

eGullet members have a mostly loving relationship with offal.  You've already discussed tripe, with a side trip to spleen.  What are some of your other favorite stops along the offal high-  (or maybe low-) way?

I really miss haggis made of sheep's stomach (the bag) and its liver. Beef haggis is available in the US but I don't eat beef.

I also enjoy making a recipe with chicken livers, creme fraiche, peppercorns. Very tasty.

I also enjoy eating fish eyeballs (straight out of the cooked fish) but I don't know if that counts as offal (probably not).

Foodie_Penguin

[Suzanne F]

I really miss haggis made of sheep's stomach (the bag) and its liver. Beef haggis is available in the US but I don't eat beef.

Beef haggis??? Do tell!

[Pan]

I really miss haggis made of sheep's stomach (the bag) and its liver. Beef haggis is available in the US but I don't eat beef.

Just curious: Why don't you eat beef? Also, do you actually eat the hard white matter in fish eyes?