SCRAPPLE: The Original "Brown 'n' Serve" Food!

More than 200 years ago--long before anyone thought of this clever name--mothers in Colonial America were "browning and serving" a pre-cooked product. Its name was--and still is--"scrapple".

Those lucky families were Dutch colonists who sailed from Holland in 17th and 18th centuries and settled along the Delaware River after clearing land and building log cabins in the majestic White Oak forests that then lined those lovely shores.

Scrapple is probably the first All American pork food. It was "invented" in Chester County, Pennsylvania's oldest settlement--and was the logical result of thriftiness and love of good eating that characterized Chester's early Dutch settlers.

The nourishing liquid and succulent meat bits that remained in the big iron kettle, after liverwurst and other pork products were prepared, could not be wasted. Cornmeal and spices were added, and the mixture was cooked, then jelled in loaf-shaped tins.

Some people confuse its name with the word , scraps, but scrapple was never made from scraps, i.e., defined as waste. At the time the name was given to the then new pork product. It meant small bits or pieces, left-overs or "remnants of value".

Scrapple tasted so good, was so easy to serve in so many different ways, that it soon became a favorite dish, growing in popularity as the country grew. Benjamin Franklin refers affectionately to Philadelphia's scrapple in his first writings. George Washington's cook was Pennsylvania Dutch, and the first President's fondness for scrapple lasted his life-time.

The colonists also liked scrapple's long "keeping" quality. This was important when automatic refrigerators--or even ice-boxes--were unheard of. To preserve food during the warm months the settlers built small "ice houses," sunk half-way into the cool ground. During the winter they cut blocks of ice from ponds, lakes, rivers and stored them under a thick layer of sawdust. Here they kept their perishable foods, hoping that the supply of ice would last through the summer.

Meats that were salt or smoke cured lasted longest. Scrapple was next on the list--adding a "fresh" tasting meat dish to the colonists', limited menus.

Habbersett, pride of the "Scrapple Capital," is made from the family's secret recipe, unchanged since the company's founding, more than 100 years ago. Even then, the hogs were prime, lean, mid-westerners. Habbersett's is real old-fashioned country scrapple, a generous blend nutritious flavored lean pork, stone ground whole wheat flour, highest quality cornmeal, salt and natural spices. It's still made on the same farmland where it originated. Only the people, buildings and techniques have changed, and they are among the industry's most efficient.