Favorite Local Foods

Hi All,

Just thought I'd start a thread listing favorite local foods, where you can get them and what makes them special to us. For myself, there is a long list since I've been fortunate enough to live and travel all over the northeast. Here are just a few:

Salt potatoes, picked those up in Syracuse, NY reminds me of summer clambakes on the ski-slopes great with melted butter
Beef-on -weck, picked this up while I lived in the Buffalo area and traveled to SW NY reminds me of Olean, NY where my Dad grew up
Vernors, the best ginger ale ever, picked this up while I lived in the Buffalo area
Buffalo wings, buffalo style. Anyone from the Buffalo area can tell you they just don't taste the same anywhere else.
Good Canadian Beer, living close to the border was great while it lasted.
Soft Pretzels, none better fresh from a Philly bakery, picked this up living near Philly for 25 years.
Boost, jam packed with caffeine, available only in South Jersey near Philly. It comes as a concentrate that you make yourself.
Cheese steaks, Philly area, never the same elsewhere although just as good in some places.
Goods Blue label potato chips, Berks County PA, the chips in that part of PA are the best available and Goods Blue is the best of the best.
Jolt Cola, kept me awake on many long car trips, sadly not available many places any more and not as good after they changed the recipe to make it cheaper. A Rochester NY product I picked up in King of Prussia, PA

Well, I could go on but it's time for someone else to have their say.

From the PA Dutch;

Scrapple, finding good stuff can be a challenge; I am going to try some new stuff tomorrow. Listed ingredients include pork head meat, buckwheat flour and pork liver. They don’t mention coriander but maybe that’s included with the generic “spices”

Shoo Fly Pie, good wet bottom shoo fly pie made with a good molasses. The darker the goo the better.

Whoopie pies, invented here but the New Englanders decided to individually package them and sell them one at a time in convenience stores. In Pennsylvania you buy them 4 or 6 at a time in the grocery store usually made by the in-store bakery. Pumpkin with a cream cheese filling is the best.


South-east Pennsylvania and parts of New Jersey;

Tastykakes http://www.tastykake.com/ they make snack cakes and pies, aka junk food

gaw wrote:From the PA Dutch;

Scrapple, finding good stuff can be a challenge; I am going to try some new stuff tomorrow. Listed ingredients include pork head meat, buckwheat flour and pork liver. They don’t mention coriander but maybe that’s included with the generic “spices”

Shoo Fly Pie, good wet bottom shoo fly pie made with a good molasses. The darker the goo the better.

Whoopie pies, invented here but the New Englanders decided to individually package them and sell them one at a time in convenience stores. In Pennsylvania you buy them 4 or 6 at a time in the grocery store usually made by the in-store bakery. Pumpkin with a cream cheese filling is the best.


South-east Pennsylvania and parts of New Jersey;

Tastykakes http://www.tastykake.com/ they make snack cakes and pies, aka junk food

Those are on my list too! All I can get around here though are the whoopie pies. In CNY they were known as Scooter Pies.

What is your favorite brand of scrapple? I was always trying something new but never settled on a favorite.

wlape3 wrote:What is your favorite brand of scrapple? I was always trying something new but never settled on a favorite.

My favorite was the stuff my Dad’s uncle made when I was a kid. Dad’s family always butchered every winter for his mom and brother and sisters and others. His uncle was the butcher and supervised the operation. His scrapple was the best, maybe because it was what I grew up on.

Today I made some called “Country Store Brand” made in Pennsdale, PA. It is pretty good for store bought scrapple. Hatfield brand tastes good for a mass produced product.

Most people I know like to cut it thick, maybe 3/8” or 1/2” and brown it both sides and eat it topped with molasses. I like to cut it thin, about 1/4” and brown both sides a little harder and eat it plain.

Things I found in New England

Goya Jamaican style Ginger Beer, I found it for sale in Springfield, MA and can’t find it in Pennsylvania. I think I have to look harder because Goya foods are sold here including some of the soft drinks.

Moxie, I like the stuff. I think it comes from Maine. It was sold at my local grocery store in Pennsylvania up until a few years ago. I don’t know what happened. I can still get it up in Mass and Maine when I get there.

gaw wrote:

wlape3 wrote:What is your favorite brand of scrapple? I was always trying something new but never settled on a favorite.

My favorite was the stuff my Dad’s uncle made when I was a kid. Dad’s family always butchered every winter for his mom and brother and sisters and others. His uncle was the butcher and supervised the operation. His scrapple was the best, maybe because it was what I grew up on.

Today I made some called “Country Store Brand” made in Pennsdale, PA. It is pretty good for store bought scrapple. Hatfield brand tastes good for a mass produced product.

Most people I know like to cut it thick, maybe 3/8” or 1/2” and brown it both sides and eat it topped with molasses. I like to cut it thin, about 1/4” and brown both sides a little harder and eat it plain.

Things I found in New England

Goya Jamaican style Ginger Beer, I found it for sale in Springfield, MA and can’t find it in Pennsylvania. I think I have to look harder because Goya foods are sold here including some of the soft drinks.

Moxie, I like the stuff. I think it comes from Maine. It was sold at my local grocery store in Pennsylvania up until a few years ago. I don’t know what happened. I can still get it up in Mass and Maine when I get there.

My grandmother used to make scrapple but I never had a chance to try it. She grew up in NY but her family lived in Delaware for a while. Maybe that's where she picked it up or it's a German thing. I too like it thin and plain. For me it's best when it's crisp.

You should be able to get the Goya Jamaican in PA. I recall buying it there myself although I lived fairly close to Philly and other areas with large hispanic communities. Do you have a Redners or Weis nearby? You could try there.

Moxie is from MA, I think. I used to buy it there often. I also like it although we seem to be in the minority. At one time in the 1920's or so it was the most popular soft drink around. Not sure what caused it to fade away like it did.

If it doesn't have Cheese Whiz in it, then it is NOT a Philly cheese steak!

Pork roll from Trenton, N.J. (pronounced (Tret en)

tomato pies, similar to pizza

Yep, longtime Moxie drinker here. When I asked for it in CA, I got some straaaange looks!!

I had some sent out to me, & some buddies of mine almost barfed when they took a sip!! It's an acquired taste. My grandfather told me years ago that todays formula is super sweet -- back in the old days it was very very bitter ...... you had to have MOXIE to drink it, hence the name.


EDIT: just checked & it says Cornucopia Beverages, Inc. Bedford, NH. They must've changed, because it used to be made in MA.

New Years day coming up, the tradition is pork and sour kraut, I like mine on mashed potatoes. And potatoe filling with gravy and dried corn. Summertime calls for corn fritters and don't forget the baked corn pie, YUM YUM.

Crab Cake at Faidley's in the Lexington Market in Baltimore. Trouble is that, after theirs, no others make the grade.

I second the Vernor's Ginger Ale. Discovered it in Michigan. "Pale Dry" just doesn't cut it after Vernor's.

I was making Philly Cheesesteaks at Steer Inn in high school in 1969. They've been corrupted since then. They don't have "Cheese Wiz" and the meat isn't ripped apart or "Steak-ums." No peppers or mushrooms, either. (Or swiss cheese, Sen. Kerry!) Fried onions, white american cheese and pizza sauce for me, thanks. One of the keys is the Borzilla roll, though -- fresh and just a bit chewy.

Clam chowder at the Parker House in Boston. It's a meal.

My favorite is the one and only, Bearded Clam!!! An afternoon delight just like the song.

I also like a fish taco.

I am a Ginger Ale lover also and discovered the absolute best. blows vernors away...

i actually stopped by and saw and bought 10 cases to sell/use when i had the convience store.

the oldest bottling co in the US it said. the story behind it is awsome whigs and tory troops....

Hamer South carolina..

http://blenheimshrine.com/

Living on the Canadian border has some advantages, like going to Quebec for poutine. You can find it in the US, but without the real poutine sauce and fresh cheese curd it isn't the same.

pork and kraut is a new years tradition for my family
pickled beets and red beet eggs
scrapple
ring bologna (hippies is my favorite)
lebanon bologna
summer sausage (dietricks)
perogies
potato chips fried in lard
chow chow
shoo fly pie
ap cake
ham and string beans

Hmmm where should i start!
Bixlers smoked sausage
Good butcher made scrapple, Bixlers,Troutmans,Snyders, and Wherys are all good
Snyders summer sausage
Bixlers ring pudding
Wherys souse
Charlies pizza from Pottsville, it always was something my grandmother and mom would bring home after a shopping trip
Miones pizza from Tower City
Coney Island ANYTHING from pottsville
Guers ice tea

markviii wrote:Living on the Canadian border has some advantages, like going to Quebec for poutine. You can find it in the US, but without the real poutine sauce and fresh cheese curd it isn't the same.

Poutine is another favorite of mine. I like the one at St. Hubert's which has a spicy gravy. I also like the smoked meat sandwiches they sell in the Montreal area. My favorite place was the Champlain Mall near the Champlain bridge. I didn't think Moe's Smoked Meat was all that good.

http://www.st-hubert.com/EN/Home