8 Pennsylvania Foods That Horrify Out-of-Staters

Think you’ve eaten your way through Pennsylvania because you’ve had a soft pretzel?

Not quite.

The state keeps a pantry of dishes that send first-time visitors reaching for a translation.

These are the Pennsylvania foods that horrify out-of-staters and delight the people who grew up on them.

Scrapple

Pennsylvania puts scrapple on the breakfast plate right next to the eggs, and the Pennsylvania Dutch have done it for generations.

The recipe starts with pork scraps, cornmeal, and the parts of the hog the butcher couldn’t sell any other way.

German settlers near Philadelphia cooked the first batches and called it panhaas.

Everything but the oink.

Cooks pour the warm mush into a loaf pan, chill it overnight, then slice it and fry each piece crisp.

The edges crackle while the middle stays soft.

Say “boiled hog scraps” to a table in Denver, and watch forks go down fast.

Pennsylvanians just reach for the apple butter.

Fries in Sandwiches

Pittsburgh built its signature sandwich at Primanti Bros., and the fries go inside the bread, not beside it.

Grilled meat, melted cheese, tomato, a tangle of vinegary coleslaw, and a handful of fries all stack between two thick slices of Italian bread.

Joe Primanti started building them that way in 1933, down in the Strip District.

The point was speed.

Truck drivers on the overnight shift needed one hand for the wheel, so the whole meal went in the bread.

Tourists still ask where the side of fries went.

Locals point at the sandwich.

City Chicken

City chicken confuses every out-of-stater in Pennsylvania for one simple reason: there’s no chicken in it.

The dish is cubes of pork, sometimes veal, pushed onto a wooden skewer, breaded, and fried or baked until golden.

Cooks around Pittsburgh and Scranton invented it in the 1930s, back when pork cost less than a whole chicken.

They shaped the skewers to mimic a drumstick and gave the dish a name to match.

No feathers involved.

Grandmothers in the coal country still make it for Sunday dinner and hand the hot skewers straight to the kids.

Order it at a diner and you’ll get a fork, a skewer, and zero poultry.

Chipped Ham Barbecue

Chipped chopped ham built a following across western Pennsylvania, and Pittsburgh treats it like its own food group.

The meat is ham trimmings pressed into a loaf, then shaved so thin at the deli slicer that it falls into ribbons.

Isaly’s, the old dairy and deli chain, made it famous after World War II as a cheap packed lunch.

Cheap and filling.

For the barbecue version, cooks warm those ribbons in a pot of sweet sauce and pile them onto a soft bun.

It looks like a sloppy joe, only pinker and messier.

Church basements and Steelers tailgates run through trays of it every fall.

Sweet Lebanon Bologna

Lebanon bologna comes from Lebanon County in Pennsylvania Dutch country, and it tastes nothing like the pink lunch meat outsiders picture.

It's all beef, cured, then cold-smoked and fermented for days until it turns dark, tangy, and a little sour.

The smoke comes from hardwood, and the tang comes from the slow ferment, not from any bottle of vinegar.

The sweet version folds brown sugar and molasses into that tang.

Not your deli bologna.

Many Pennsylvanians layer it on crackers with a sharp cheese, or pack it up to a hunting cabin for the week.

Newcomers expect a soft slice of deli meat and get a smack of sour smoke instead.

Then they go back for a second piece.

Shoofly Pie

Shoofly pie shows up at every Pennsylvania Dutch bake sale, and it's basically a cake of molasses baked into a pie shell.

The filling is molasses, brown sugar, and water, all tucked under a thick layer of buttery crumbs.

There are no eggs, which is why farm families baked it in winter when the hens slowed down.

The wet-bottom kind stays gooey underneath, while the dry-bottom kind holds firm for dunking in coffee.

In Lancaster County, one slice with black coffee counts as a full breakfast.

Yes, for breakfast.

The name has nothing to do with insects and everything to do with a molasses brand named for a circus mule.

Out-of-staters brace for pecan pie and bite into pure molasses.

Pork and Sauerkraut

Pork and sauerkraut lands on Pennsylvania tables every New Year's Day, and skipping it feels like tempting fate to many families.

The Pennsylvania Dutch tie the meal to luck for the year ahead.

Pigs root forward when they eat, so the pork stands for progress.

The sauerkraut, shredded green and coiled like coins, stands for prosperity.

Luck you can eat.

Families simmer the two together for hours, until the pork falls apart and the whole kitchen smells like vinegar.

Transplants from Texas raise an eyebrow at kraut for a holiday, then clean their plate down to the last bite.

Cabbage and Noodles

Haluski turns up at Pennsylvania church fairs and fire hall dinners, and it's exactly what the English name says: cabbage and noodles.

Cooks fry green cabbage in butter until it goes soft and sweet, then fold in wide egg noodles and a heavy hit of black pepper.

That's the whole dish.

Eastern European families in the coal towns and around Pittsburgh brought it over, and it became a Friday staple during Lent.