You don't know what you have until it's gone. I never realized this quite so strongly until I moved from Maryland to Boston. In Maryland, and really all of the Mid-Atlantic, scrapple was available in bountiful supply at every grocery store. For example, this is was what you saw right next to the bacon in a Virginia grocery store:
And yet, when I lived with scrapple so easily available to me, I rarely bought and cooked it. Now I've been living in Boston for 3 years, and every day I wish I could just once pick up a scrapple loaf along with bread and milk on a simple trip to the grocery store.
On my scrapple Facebook page, I'd heard stories of peole in Florida finding Jones Country Style Scrapple in their Publix freezer section. It caused me to rexamine my own grocery store's freezer section. Every visit, I'd linger a little longer among the frozen meats. I'd even move things around. "Could there be a loan forgotten scrapple loaf in the way way back?" No dice. Not in Shaw's, Star Market or Stop & Shop.
And then I heard reports of scrapple being found at Market Basket. For those not in the Boston area, Market Basket is a local grocery chain found in Somerville and the surrounding area. I don't live particularly close to one, and though it's a local establishment, I'd never stepped inside. Still, if it meant getting my hands on some scrapple, it would certainly be worth the trip.
When I walked into the Market Basket in Somerville, my heart was racing just a bit, and I couldn't get myself back to the feezer section fast enough. It's certainly possible I knocked over a lady in a walker or pushed a pregnant woman out of my way as I ran back there.
"Freezer section...meats...where are the meats?" My mind was racing. And finally, there it was, right next to the "Grillers" and frozen beef patties:
Some beautiful bricks of scrapple. Frozen scrapple is certainly not ideal (though it sounds a bit better than vegan scrapple). But when your option is no scrapple at all, or defrosted scrapple, you settle.
So there it is. If you want scrapple from a grocery store in Boston, go find your nearest Market Basket.
Have you seen scrapple elsewhere in Boston? Let me know in the comments!
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