Crunching on Crackling and Stirring the Scrapple

 On Sunday Elliott and I returned, a little hesitantly at first, unsure if yesterday's invitation still stood, and hadn't been given with 'Bud Lite laden' generosity. But as we walked to the back of the garage, familiar faces welcomed us, smiling even more broadly as they spied the cases of beer we carried. We were greeted warmly and invited to come out back where the action was.

 Sam was already hard at work stirring the crackling pot, pork fat with the skin still attached, which when cooked until the skin was crispy, would then be pressed to remove any further liquid fat and then left to dry out. The remaining fat would become lard. On the back of a pickup truck was a batch of crackling made earlier which we were invited to try. Without any hesitation I stuffed a piece into my mouth; it was divine. Crunchy and crispy and oozing with porky goodness.

 

 

I wandered back into the garage where some of the lads were preparing cuts of meat from one of the hogs. Chris held up a fine pair of hams and pointed out a pile that would go through a ban saw to be cut into ribs, joints and more hams. Someone else pointed to the uncut pig and chuckled that it was his ex wife curing on the table, causing an uproar of loud laughter, including my own. But I did have a quick look around me just in case she was there.

The lads dragged the huge second carcass across to a cleared table where Mike and Moe promptly began chopping it up. I'd had a go at moving the pig with Amanda, Moe's wife, and even just pulling it across the table was beyond us.  Amanda grabbed a huge blade, and alongside the men, began slicing. Elliott and I stood well back and watched. Elliott later commented on the slick slicing sound as the blade slid through the huge pig effortlessly.

 

Jerry was outside keeping an eye on the crackling which, by now, had lost its pale fleshy appearance and had turned golden and crispy. Both Elliott and I had a go stirring it, which has to be done continuously to stop it sticking. Once the chunks of fat start floating on the surface and don't need the constant stirring, then they're cooked. Sam cleared out the excess fat, which was completely clear and clean, like water. "Crisco ain't got nothing on this shit." exclaimed Jay, Sam's brother. We all nodded in agreement as we looked down into the pot. Sam also commented that the lard made excellent hand cream. I wasn't quite so enthusiastic about that. The golden chunks were pushed through a press where yet more clear fat dripped into a pot below, and the skins were laid out on the truck bed to dry. I did try one of these but they were more chewy than I liked, they needed to dry out more.

 

                                          

Then it was time to focus on the scrapple pot. I did chuckle when I realized one of the stirring tools was a canoe paddle. But it definitely worked well. Sam said, "Someone's up the creek without a paddle, 'cause we've got it!" 

When we had first arrived, the pot hadn't looked remotely appealing, raw body parts floating in steaming water, but now, several hours later, it resembled a giant stew. Pretty much everything that isn't used for the 'meat cuts' ends up in the pot, kidney, heart, liver, and any excess meat pulled from the bones. "Everything, except for the squeal," said Jerry, "And that's because you can't catch it!" added Chuck. The tongue is kept aside as it's too good to become scrapple, so it was pulled out once it was cooked, then sliced up, everyone taking a piece and closing their eyes in contentment as they chewed. I did the same, it was amazing.

All the meat from the scrapple pot was pulled out by Sam and taken into the garage where it was pulled from the bones, chopped into smaller pieces and then pushed through a grinder. I grabbed some latex gloves to help, it was hot work. I also helped to pull out the meat from the scrapple pot before it went to the garage, using the canoe paddle to blindly grope around the pot for the meat which I then plopped into Sam's saucepan. The smaller pieces were hard to find through the steam and bubbling liquid and I was incredulous when Sam bent down and thrust his hand into the gravy to grab them and make sure there weren't any bones left. These rural lads are made of tough stuff!

Before the last stage of the scrapple making began, the sausage meat was quickly made. The meat that wasn't being put aside for chops, bacon and ribs had been pushed through the grinder and was now in a huge pile on the table. Mustard powder, sage, horseradish, salt and pepper were added and then mixed up by hand. Sam had run a little experiment to show us how different a cooked patty would be, if one had the seasoning added before going through the grinder, or added after having been ground. The patty on the right was the sausage meat with the seasoning added after grinding, and was firmer, while the other patty was "sloppy" as Sam described it. They both tasted equally wonderful after being cooked, though, so I had no preference.

And the it was all hands on deck. The scrapple had to be completed and needed constant stirring as Sam added ingredients. All faces became serious and Elliott and I stood back to watch the process. The 'gravy', from which the bones and meat had been removed, was still boiling over the fire, so the ground up meat was added back into the pot. Salt, pepper, sage, flour and cornmeal were poured in. I was amazed at the quantity of bags and pots that were emptied into the mixture, and secretly wondered if the end product might be too 'sagey' or too thick due to the flour. But Sam didn't bat an eyelid. He steadily poured in the ingredients while other lads kept the mixture moving with paddles or anything that would stir. As it thickened and as arms slowed down, Sam took over, grabbing the canoe paddle from Jerry and grinding the mixture around to an even beat that Jerry picked up on, imitating the scratching noise the paddle made on the bottom of the pot. The mush thickened, looking now like a porridge mix, and slopping occasionally over the side. Once Sam was happy with the concoction, the pot and its heavy molten contents were lifted off the flames and onto the ground. But not without spilling any. A large puddle was inadvertently tipped onto the grass, and to everyone's amusement, Mike accidentally trod and slipped in it. This was even funnier because Mike has a shoe fetish, owning a large collection of designer footwear and was wearing a treasured pair of Nike tennis shoes. But help was close at hand in the form of a hosepipe and he was soon washed off. Regarding the puddle on the floor, Jerry said the cat and the bear would take care of that, and I wondered if that would be true. Meanwhile Sam had grabbed a large saucepan and had begun ladling it into foil containers on the ground. These were then carried carefully into the garage and placed on the table to cool down. Before long, the huge cauldron was empty and Chris was given the saucepan to lick clean. Mike turned down this offer as he only liked his scrapple cooked, which I understood, even though technically the scrapple was now cooked. But once cooled down and stored in a fridge or freezer, it would be made even more tasty by spending a few minutes fried in a pan until brown on both sides. Yet I still had a lick from an offered spoon of the mixture and it tasted heavenly.

I made a short video of the scrapple pot and Elliott posted his photos and a superb video here. He really focused well on taking wonderful portraits of the people involved while I was more focused on the methods these folk used. His photos are amazing. We ended up spending several hours with this crowd, many of whom, we found out later, didn't know each other either before this day. They had all come together to help cut up the pigs and make the scrapple and crackling. It had been a tremendous weekend for us, and one that I knew we'd be lucky to witness again. It had been a stroke of luck that we had passed them and stopped the day before, and a show of immense warmth and friendliness that had allowed us to return the next day and watch the processes. We had shared many laughs with these wonderful people, who had all allowed us to 'get in the way', stick cameras in their faces and ask countless questions, and then sent us home with waves and a huge container of hot scrapple, which I balanced on my lap all the way to the Blue House on top of my jacket.

We met Sam the following weekend, at his food truck location, and gave him printed photos and a thumb drive of photos, then stopped at Moe's and Amanda's house to drop off more prints, a journey that was taken after eating a mighty fine breakfast of eggs, toast and some extremely delicious golden brown slabs of scrapple.

Amazing Caverns with Pigs before the Snow

Elliott and I got up early Saturday morning and drove to the Skyline Drive. We had been watching the weather reports and knew there was a good chance of some snow or ice on the mountains, a perfect photo opportunity. Alas, when we arrived we were informed that only the first five miles were open, the rest closed due to poor road conditions, so we turned around. We then decided to explore the Skyline Caverns, a couple of miles down the road. I'd been a few years ago but was happy to go again, especially as last time I hadn't checked out the mirror maze that was also on the site.

 We bought our cave tickets but had to wait for a later tour, since social distancing meant the groups were smaller. So we went to the maze first and were delighted to discover we had it all to ourselves. I wasn't expecting much, assuming it was a kids attraction, but after a couple of minutes I realized that this was also great fun for adults too. There was a really creepy soundtrack looping the whole time we were in there, which initially, I found a little disconcerting,but which I was soon distracted from since all my attention was taken with negotiating the maze. The mirrors were immaculately clean so it was very difficult to ascertain where the openings were. I soon realized that I could follow the seams where the mirrors met the floor but this meant I wasn't looking ahead. And also, those seams were also replicated on the floor, radiating out from every column, so ultimately it was very confusing. Elliott simply held out his fingers to determine whether he could walk forward or not, but I deemed this to be cheating, and didn't copy him. Naturally, like Elliott, I also wanted to avoid a broken nose and black eyes, but tried to use my judgement rather than taking the easy route. At times I wasn't even sure if I was following the 'real' Elliott or his reflection.

The whole room was filled with ornate arches and columns, of course many of these were reflections, and there were a couple of green forest scenes, one with a tree and another with a dragon. An illuminated dragon egg could also be seen, but not the way to get to it. We thought we made our way through quite easily but when we backtracked to get more photos we found ourselves actually lost for brief spells or going round in circles.

 This maze was actually a lot of fun, a far better experience than I had expected, and I was very proud to discover it had been created by an English firm, Adrian Fisher Mazes Ltd. It really is a beautiful maze and incredibly deceiving, appearing to be quite large, due to all the reflections, when in fact, it's in quite a small room, which used to be a general store. We spent a fair amount of time taking photos and admiring our repetitive reflections. I loved the photo above which Elliott took of me, reminding me of a witches coven. I took a short video on my iPhone which was pretty tough work, trying to watch my screen while also attempting to keep walking forward without knocking into glass. Plus, I was getting dizzy from turning around in so many circles.

We walked back over to the cave reception and only had to wait a few minutes before our tour started. I was pleased to be wearing my mask as it kept my face warm as we descended to the lower temperatures of the caves. Most caves have a constant temperature of 54F and although I found it a little chilly at first, I was soon warm, rolling up my sweatshirt sleeves, while noting others had jackets on. This is my second trip here. Having caves so close to home is a novelty and an attraction I like to support, especially since they are home to an unusual crystal calcite and aragonite formation called anthodites, which in Greek means flower-like. And even Bing Crosby, when visiting Front Royal, considered the caverns a worthwhile visit. They were first opened in 1939 after huge amounts of mud and clay were removed from the tunnels. Today, only about 20 percent of the caves and tunnels found are open to the public but that still leaves just over a mile of walking and many wonders to take in. The tunnels are easy to traverse, nearly all the paths on the same level and no tight areas to squeeze through. Every time I enter any of the caverns in our area I stop for a few minutes to marvel about how I'm looking at formations that have formed over fifty to sixty millions years. Of course I want to touch everything to make the experience even more humbling but naturally that's not allowed, the oils on our hands would change the rock.

These 'living' caverns, called so because the constantly dripping water is continuously changing the rock formations, have five underground streams running through them, three of which we saw on our tour. The water and formations are lit beautifully by an award winning light display. And of course during the tour we had the moment I always look forward to, when the guide shuts off the lights completely, plunging us into total darkness, while explaining that a relatively short duration of this would send us mad. It's a strange, almost claustrophobic sensation to be unable to see anything, especially when we also stand in silence, straining to hear the distance trickle of water of the streams.

The highlight of these particular caverns are the beautiful flower shaped formations that form in a small part of the caverns, six sided crystalline blooms that resembled giant frost formations and are protected by Virginia State Law. The photo above showing the 'drip' from the anthodite cluster which is called The Chandelier. At 18" long it's the longest and oldest anthodite known to man. They grow abundantly in only four locations in the world, three in the U.S. (New Mexico, Tennessee and VA), and one in France. Their growth rate is about 1 inch every 7,000 years.

 After the tour we left the caverns and decided to reach the Skyline Drive through Sperryville, hoping to see some ice on top of the mountain. Taking the back roads we trundled along, noting that snow had settled on the peaks in the distance, and heavy clouds draped as though caught on the mountain tops. Since Elliott was driving I had plenty of opportunity to take in the scenery, and shrieked when I spotted what I thought was a hog hanging from a wooden frame in someone's front yard. We turned around and drove back, wanting to take a discreet shot or two from the road, but we were delighted to be greeted by a couple of guys as we approached who asked us if we wanted to take photos. Needing no further encouragement we grabbed our cameras and walked over to meet them.

It soon became apparent that these guys were at the end of their day and winding down with a few beers. There were actually two hogs hanging from wooden frames, their carcasses stripped of innards and cleaned, pink meat and pearly white fat ready to be cut up the following day. We were told that Grandma had shot them that morning with a 45, and I had no idea if they were telling the truth or not. The piglets had been purchased at the beginning of the year, 3 months old and weighing 30 pounds. The weight of them at their demise was estimated to be 550 pounds each. A huge pot containing the innards sat on the grass and we were informed these would be used to make scrapple the following day. My ears pricked up at this. Scrapple, in my opinion, is one of America's finest contributions to the food scene. I love the stuff. They were also making crackling the next day, and my mouth watered. They must have spotted my drool because they then invited us to return the following day to watch and take photos, as long as we came accompanied by a large quantity of Bud Light. What an amazing chance of a lifetime opportunity to witness how these tasty foods are created. We accepted immediately and very ecstatically. Well definitely on my part anyway, I could hardly contain myself. The guys willingly posed for a few photos and we promised to return the next day. We left them to their cans of beer and continued our drive to the mountain top.

The weather changed dramatically as we climbed towards the peak. The temperature dropped, the sky became grey and dense with snow clouds, and we could see thin snow collected on tree branches and the grass. But as we reached the parking lot at the top the clouds decided to dispense with their watery cargo and flakes of snow began to fall rapidly upon us, getting thicker as the minutes passed. We left the car and walked about, already a couple of inches had collected on the ground. It was magical, the bare trees looking like a scene from Narnia. I took photos then simply stood looking up at the sky, the snowflakes landing gently on my face like tender taps from icy fingertips, although it felt a few times like pokes in the eye as a few flakes made a bullseye with direct contact on my corneas. Yet it was serenely beautiful, a magical moment in time, existing just up here on the mountain, and seemingly just for us. I suddenly became aware that my hands were frozen. I'd been wandering around with my jacket unzipped and with no gloves or hat on. My hair was sporting a white veil, we were getting wet, and so it was time to return to the warmth of the car, and drive back down towards home, where we would charge batteries and buy boxes of beer in readiness for a day of fun with our new found friends the following day.