You can't spell scrapple without "crap"

I was working at an Internet start-up about antiques a few years ago. I can't remember how the subject even came up, but I mentioned that I liked scrapple to a co-worker. She made one of those faces of disgust when I told her what it was made of and she said that she wouldn't eat anything that had the word "crap" in it.

For the uninitiated, scrapple is a Pennsylvania Dutch specialty consisting of pork and cornmeal. It is like mush but is then fried and usually served at breakfast like bacon or sausage. What makes it unappealing to some is that the pork part of scrapple can be any part of the pig. It can consist of pig hearts, tongue, liver, anything that is left over. The saying about scrapple is that it is made of "everything but the oink".

Well this past weekend, I went to visit some relatives in Philadelphia and then decided to take a day trip to Lancaster. I love to eat at the Amish style restaurants where I can get my fill of fried chicken, buttered noodles, and vegetables. I especially like the sweet dried corn. In fact that was one of the main reasons to head to Pennsylvania Dutch was so I can buy a few boxes of Cope's Corn. They are hard to find outside of Pennsylvania Dutch and when you do, they cost quite a bit.


But getting back to scrapple. The first stop was for breakfast at Dienner's Country Restaurant in
Ronks, Pennsylvania. They offer a breakfast buffet that is not as varied as an Old Country Buffet but they offer many dishes from the area. The most important dish to me was the scrapple. They offered the scrapple made with pork and for the more health conscience I guess, they had a turkey one too ("everything but the gobble?"). They also had pancakes, sausage, home fries, scrambled eggs, fruit, oatmeal, grits, biscuits and sausage gravy, smoked sausage, french toast, and few more items. The quality is not bad and it only cost $5.95. By the way did I mention they had scrapple?

After a big breakfast, I headed out to do some shopping. There are quite a few outlet stores in the area. The place is geared towards tourists with lots of shopping and family chain restaurants. It is quite a dizzying mix when you consider that many Amish residents live in the area and can be seen on the main roads riding their horse and buggy. What I find kind of amusing is that there are some Amish that will wear most of the traditional dark clothing but will wearing Croc shoes or driving a mini-van. Then again, I shouldn't be making any stereotypes. While at Dienner's the waitress came up to me and seeing that I am Asian asked if I had food like this in my country. Being the 6th generation living in the United States, I could have made a smart remark but refrained so and just said that I had been to that restaurant before.

Just before leaving Lancaster to head back to New York, I decided to get an early dinner. I had been to many other Amish family style restaurants like Miller's, Plain and Fancy, Stoltzfus, and others. I was looking to at least get some dried sweet corn and not pay the arm and a leg that some of those buffets charge. Granted many of those places offered discount coupons on the Internet and travel guides but they still can be pretty pricey.

After looking at menus and reviews, I chose to go to The Family Cupboard. The reviews on Yelp were pretty good and someone mentioned that they had the dried corn there. Plus their buffet was under $11. I got there around 3:30pm, just before they were switching over to dinner. Maybe that was the reason but the food and choices were only OK. They had fried chicken, baked chicken, chicken and dumplings, beef tips in gravy, ham, and an assortment of vegetables from mashed potatoes, carrots, green beans, beets, beans, and sweet shoe peg corn.

But they didn't have the dried sweet corn. What a bummer! And to make matters worse was the food was only OK. Except for the fried chicken and only by a little bit, you can do just as well at Old Country Buffet. The buttered noodles looked exceptionally vile, just a heap of over cooked pasta that was disintergrating in to itself. It wasn't terrible and the people were nice but there are so many other places to try in the area that I won't be heading back.