Are you a one percenter?

[JohnMOhio]

Well my fellow posters. From what I read tonight, I don't think we missed a thing that we either experienced or was aware of. PWC reminded me of the trip to the outhouse. It was at my Grandfathers home in West Virginia. It was a vacations every couple of years for a week or two. In between our visits, Grandpa would come to our home in Cleveland and it was usually around Easter Time. We would pick him up at the train station and he only had one large suitcase. In it, was smoked bacon, ham, pork chops that he processed. When he went back, mom always filled that suitcase up with new clothes for him.

[PWC]

Cracklings...that was what my aunt called the reduced pig skins from the process of hog butchering. The pork belly trimmings went into a large pot, heated over an outdoor fire to render out the lard. The skins or "cracklings" float to the top and are skimmed off. Every year, sometime between Thanksgiving and Christmas we would receive a package with grease spots showing thru...CRACKLINGS!

Good in cornbread, or with biscuits, bacon taste goes with anything breakfast. These things now called "pork skins" that taste and feel like they are made from styrofoam packing material are not real.

[JB White]

Doc told me the factory packaged pork rinds were a healthy snack. As a kid I liked the stovetop cracklings heavy on the salt. Then the Texican kids moved in across the way from us and I learned to drown them in hot sauce.

In the 80’s we would venture into the Mexican neighborhoods where a couple of the meat markets offered chicharon hanging from the ceiling. 24 to 30 inches long. Bring it home wrapped in paper before breaking off chunks to gnaw on. Good with beer!
The pork skins i sometimes get from the UK are more dense than the American counterparts. Over there they are called Scratchin’s.

[PWC]

If you can find thick cut bacon with the rind on; that rind is cracklings.

[JohnMOhio]

I remember Mom would get a slab of bacon. Cut the rind off and then into large bite size pieces. She would fry that up to the point the rind was still pliable. We would take a piece and chew it all evening and into the night. Tastier than bubble gum or other chewing gums of that time. That was a big treat on a Saturday night.