![\"Edwin](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/REG-L-DietrichScrapple2159.jpg\")
Edwin Kutz of Kempton stirs broth in the scrapple pot at Dietrich\u2019s Meats and Country Store in Krumsville, Greenwich Township. (BILL UHRICH\/READING EAGLE)<\/p>\nMarlin Dietrich still remembers that late July weekend in 1969.<\/p>\n
He was a young teenager helping his parents, Willard and Verna, dry several bushels of green beans that hadn\u2019t sold at their weekend stand at the Renninger\u2019s Farmer\u2019s Market in Kutztown.<\/p>\n
They were in the kitchen of their farmhouse feeding the wood stove while drying the beans in a steam dryer, a process that would make the ingredients for string beans and ham later in the winter.<\/p>\n
\u201cI dried a whole week,\u201d Dietrich said. \u201cThat was my job.\u201d<\/p>\n
A small black-and-white television in the kitchen was tuned to the Apollo 11 lunar landing that mesmerized the nation as well as the Dietrich household as Neil Armstrong and Edwin \u201cBuzz\u201d Aldrin were the first humans to explore the surface of the moon.<\/p>\n
Fast forward a couple of decades.<\/p>\n
A postcard arrives at Dietrich\u2019s Meats and Country Store, which celebrated its 50th year in Krumsville, Greenwich Township, last year.<\/p>\n
The sender mentions that he was in Allentown for a program and wanted to know where he could get some good scrapple.\u00a0 Someone recommended Dietrich\u2019s.<\/p>\n
\u201cI ended up here,\u201d he wrote. \u201cIt was great. I liked everything. And P.S., that\u2019s me on the other side.\u201d<\/p>\n
On the other side of the postcard is the photo Neil Armstrong took of Buzz Aldrin standing on the moon.<\/p>\n
\u201cImagine that,\u201d Dietrich said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have that postcard around here somewhere,\u201d he said, glancing at the walls and bookshelves of his office tucked into the corner of the store. \u201cWe\u2019re Pennsylvania Dutch. We don\u2019t throw anything out.\u201d<\/p>\n
And therein, too, lies the philosophy of scrapple.<\/p>\n
When Berks Country last visited Dietrich\u2019s in December for a feature on pork and sauerkraut, Marlin mentioned that they would be making scrapple later in the week and invited us back to watch the process, if we wanted.<\/p>\n
It would have been journalistic malpractice not to.<\/p>\n
Although the name scrapple implies waste, that isn\u2019t the case at Dietrich\u2019s.<\/p>\n
They deliberately leave some meat on the bones for the scrapple-making process.<\/p>\n
Edwin Kutz of Kempton stirs broth in the scrapple pot at Dietrich\u2019s Meats and Country Store in Krumsville, Greenwich Township. (BILL UHRICH\/READING EAGLE)<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s not meat scrap on the bone, it\u2019s a little bone. It\u2019s not scrap,\u201d he said. \u201cPeople think, \u20180h yeah, scraps.\u2019 No. It\u2019s brisket bones, pork quarter bones, you know, you got some meat on the bones and you cook it off. You get the flavor. And so, actually, what it is, if you would trim all the meat off your bones, you throw the bones away. So you leave some meat on, and you cook it up. If you want to have a fancy word instead of scrapple, say meat trimmings.\u201d<\/p>\n
Scrapple making takes an entire day, beginning with cooking the beef and pork bones early in the morning. The large scrapple pot is filled to the brim and cooked thoroughly, the resulting broth saved.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s what gives you a good broth, a good stock,\u201d Dietrich said. \u201cThe bones are what give you a good stock.\u201d<\/p>\n
There\u2019s no quick process to make scrapple the right way, Dietrich said while standing over the large scrapple pot simmering with pork and beef bones. \u201cYou can hurry, but then it won\u2019t be right.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"Workers](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/REG-L-DietrichScrapple2162.jpg\")
Workers separate meat from the bones to make scrapple at Dietrich\u2019s Meats and Country Store in Krumsville, Greenwich Township. (BILL UHRICH\/READING EAGLE)<\/p>\n
The workers in the back shop usually perform singular tasks, but scrapple making becomes a communal affair when they gather around a table to separate by hand the meat from the bones, bantering back and forth as they work.<\/p>\n
One man pulls a clump of meat from a bone and holds it up.<\/p>\n
\u201cLook, there\u2019s nothing scrap about this,\u201d he said, tossing the meat onto a growing pile of trimmings.<\/p>\n
The meat will be ground up with some other organ meats and added back to the scrapple pot along with the broth that was separated in the initial cooking.<\/p>\n
Although Dietrich doesn\u2019t have a recipe that he follows, merely seasoning the scrapple by taste, there are several consistent ingredients depending on in which county the scrapple is made.<\/p>\n
The scrapple is thickened by buckwheat flour and cornmeal.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn Berks County, people like more buckwheat,\u201d he said. \u201cIf you go to Lancaster, there\u2019s more cornmeal.\u201d<\/p>\n
Spices consist of salt, pepper and coriander. Farther west, marjoram is used instead of coriander, giving scrapple its regional derivations.<\/p>\n
\u201cDefinitely Berks, Lehigh, Northampton, it\u2019s salt, pepper and coriander,\u201d Dietrich said.\u00a0 \u201cIf you don\u2019t have coriander, it\u2019s not gonna work. But when you get out of the area, there are different recipes, you know, like everything else.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dietrich\u2019s scrapple tends to be darker than others because there\u2019s more meat in it, he said.<\/p>\n
When the scrapple in the pot reaches the right consistency, it\u2019s poured out into five-pound pans to cool, yielding a two-week supply of over 700 pounds.<\/p>\n
The best way to fry scrapple, Dietrich said, is to thinly slice it into a large, iron skillet with a spoonful of lard. Add in raw-fried potatoes \u2014 those are sliced right from the potato as opposed to home fries that are boiled first.<\/p>\n
\u201cLike my mom made them, she put the raw fries in the black-iron skillet with lard in it,\u201d he said. \u201cMan, it made it crack. They make noise because the potato had a little bit of water in it. You could tell, she was making raw fries. Yeah, but they got good.\u201d<\/p>\n
Some people like the scrapple a little bit soft in the middle, while others like it crispy, Dietrich said.<\/p>\n
The toppings for scrapple also vary.<\/p>\n
\u201cI like apple butter, some people like maple syrup,\u201d he said. \u201cSome put ketchup, honey or molasses on it.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"The](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/REG-L-DietrichScrapple2158.jpg\")
The proof of Dietrich\u2019s scrapple is in the eating at the Quality Shop restaurant in Kutztown. (BILL UHRICH\/READING EAGLE)<\/p>\n
The proof of the scrapple is in the eating, so Berks Country went in pursuit of Dietrich\u2019s scrapple out in the wild.<\/p>\n
We didn\u2019t have to drive far \u2014 just six miles south of Dietrich\u2019s to the Quality Shoppe restaurant in Kutztown.<\/p>\n
We sidled up to the counter and asked the waitress from where they got their scrapple.<\/p>\n
\u201cDietrich\u2019s!\u201d she exclaimed, with an inflection that implied, where else?<\/p>\n
The scrapple arrived thinly sliced and crispy, flopping over the edge of the plate with the home fries and eggs over easy.<\/p>\n
Some pancake syrup on top and a forkful of scrapple later, it\u2019s \u2014 in memory of Buzz Aldrin \u2014 out of this world.<\/p>\n
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