[AT] RE: Eating while doing tractor things sort of ramble

[Dean VP]

Ralph:

The cracklings I'm referring to are what is left after the hog fat has been
cooked untill there wasn't much left. I haven't seen cracklings for a long
time but I would equate them to looking a little like commercial breakfast
cereal small grape nuts! Some of the fat juice was included.

It is a shame that these processes of making lard, lye soap, and these
heritage specific foods could not be documented in video. I suspect there
are written instructions around but I haven't looked for them. 

Also used were several spices added to taste and a 50/50 mix of buckwheat
and regular flour.  Now I'm really getting an urge to find this stuff. 

Dean A. Van Peursem
Snohomish, WA 98290

CRS = Having a Photographic Memory but a shortage of unused film.

www.deerelegacy.com

http://members.cox.net/classicweb/email.htm


-----Original Message-----
From: at-bounces at lists.antique-tractor.com
[mailto:at-bounces at lists.antique-tractor.com] On Behalf Of Ralph Goff
Sent: Saturday, February 21, 2004 9:23 PM
To: Antique tractor email discussion group
Subject: Re: [AT] RE: Eating while doing tractor things sort of ramble

Well Dean, now you have got me interested enough that I am going to check
the grocery store next time I am there to see if the head cheese is
available.
Crackling is a familiar term but here it referring to the outer skin of the
pork roast which would turn brown and hard after the roast was cooked. With
good teeth you could eat it but I can recall sometimes  that was like eating
a sheet of hard plastic. Not something I'd want to try now.

Ralph in Sask.
http://www3.sk.sympatico.ca/lgoff/latestpage.html

----- Original Message -----
From: Dean VP <deanvp at att.net>
To: 'Antique tractor email discussion group' <at at lists.antique-tractor.com>
Sent: Saturday, February 21, 2004 10:40 PM
Subject: RE: [AT] RE: Eating while doing tractor things sort of ramble


> Ralph:
>
> Head Cheese was something entirely different than Scrapple or the Dutch
> thing. We had both. The head of the hog was boiled and then the head meat
> was scraped off and cooled. I don't recall it gelling other than that
caused
> by the remaining fat. It was a stringy type meat but quite tender. It too
> was refrigerated and then fried again, kind of like hash browns, and
served
> as a breakfast meat. Of course with syrup over it. Quite different from
the
> other. It was considered a real delicacy meat and was a real treat but the
> quantity was limited. Mom rendered the lard and made lye soap too. That is
> where the cracklings came from for the other. We have tried to buy Head
> Cheese in the specialty meat markets but it has never been anything like
the
> old home made stuff.
>
> When my mother was still healthy and living in Iowa and we lived on the
west
> coast, any time she visited, she would carry with her some cracklings and
> head cheese because she new it was one of my favorites. I miss her and the
> food.
>
> Maybe we will be able to find some original ingredients when we travel
> trough Iowa next month. Almond patties too!  :-)
>
> Dean A. Van Peursem
> Snohomish, WA 98290


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