If I had a nickel for every bowl of Campbell's Soup I ate when I was a kid, I'd have a lot of nickels. Some of our favorites were Chicken Noodle (of course), Chicken Gumbo, Vegetable Beef, and Pepper Pot.
I haven't seen Pepper Pot on our grocery store shelves in years and years. Maybe you can still get it where it's more popular, but not here. I haven't even thought about the stuff in years. I was reminded of it today when I read someone's post on Facebook that said this is National Pepper Pot Day.
I suspect that I might have had something to do with Campbell's Pepper Pot disappearing from the stores in this area. You see, at one time, this was my favorite soup of all. I liked it even better than Chicken Noodle.
Then my mama told me what tripe is (see photo at right). You see, I ate Pepper Pot under the assumption that tripe, those little pieces of meat in the mix, was some kind of fish. Mama disabused me of that idea. It turns out that tripe is cow stomach!
Well, eeeewwww! Why would anybody put cow stomach in my favorite soup? I was outraged. I continued for a brief time to eat the stuff whose rich peppery taste had once so pleased me. But it was never the same again.
I eventually stopped eating it altogether and began telling everyone who would listen that it contained the belly of a beast. I didn't have any trouble getting people to believe me. This was, after all, the era of the urban legend, before it was named the urban legend. For a while, folks around here wouldn't drink a Pepsi Cola if you gave them one. It was a well known fact that a man had fallen into a vat of Pepsi at the Pepsi factory and had been chopped up into mush and bottled up in Pepsi bottles before Pepsi workers discovered the mishap. (Why there was a chopper in a vat of Pepsi was never explained, and we didn't care. We just weren't drinking the stuff.)
It was also the era of razor blades in apples; green M&Ms that would make one either sterile or horny, depending upon whose version you heard; spider eggs in bubble gum; and I don't know what all.
There were also lots of urban legends that didn't involve food. (We were a paranoid nation in the 60s, if you recall.) My favorite was the one about the woman with the huge bouffant hairdo. This was the age of severely teased (or ratted) hair, which some gals wrapped in rolls of toilet paper at night and didn't comb out for a week at a time. Well this one woman, it was said, was eating lunch one day when blood started running down her face. She was rushed, I don't know, to the emergency room maybe, or the hairdresser--I'm not sure. When they combed her out, what do you think they found? (WARNING: Stop reading here if you're squeemish.) Roaches! Dozens or hundreds or millions of roaches, feeding upon her scalp.
Oh great! Now I've grossed myself out and made my scalp feel crawly. I should have told the legend about the hitchhiker instead, or the choking Doberman who ate his--well, enough or that. You get the idea. It was the age of made-up stories meant to gross one out. I understand the practice has now pretty much confined itself to the political arena.
But cow stomach in the Pepper Pot was not and is not an urban legend. It's the gosh honest truth. And I don't eat it anymore. FYI, I don't eat chit'lin's either, purportedly a food of the South. I don't know. Innards are not for me.
However, because it's Pepper Pot Day, I'm including a recipe for this potage below--in case you might want to make some in honor of National Pepper Pot Day. Have at it. I think there's still some leftover chili that I'll have instead.
INGREDIENTS
1 pound honeycomb tripe (i.e., cow stomach!)
5 slices bacon, diced
1/2 cup chopped onion
1/2 cup chopped celery
3 leeks, chopped
1 bunch fresh parsley, chopped
2 green bell peppers, diced
2 quarts beef stock
1/4 teaspoon dried thyme
1/2 teaspoon dried marjoram
1/2 teaspoon ground cloves (optional)
1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
1 bay leaf
1 teaspoon ground black pepper
1 large potato, peeled and diced
2 large carrots, diced
4 tablespoons margarine
4 tablespoons all-purpose flour
DIRECTIONS
Place the tripe or other meat that you have selected to use in a saucepan, and cover with water. Bring to a boil, and turn off the heat. Allow the meat to cool a bit in the water, and then drain and rinse. Cut into 1/4 inch pieces.
In a large heavy kettle, saute the bacon until clear. Add the onion, celery, leeks, parsley, and green peppers; saute until tender.
Stir in beef stock, thyme, marjoram, cloves, red pepper flakes, bay leaf, and black pepper. Bring the kettle to a boil, and turn down to a simmer. Cook, covered, until meat is very tender, about 2 hours.
Add the diced potato and carrots, and cook for an additional 20 minutes.
Prepare the roux by stirring the flour into the melted butter or margarine, and cooking for a moment on the stove. When the soup is done to your liking, stir in the roux. Simmer, stirring all the while, until the soup thickens a bit. Correct the seasonings.
Note: If you are like me and don't do innards, I don't see why you couldn't substitute some kind of outer meat (like beef or pork or chicken) for the tripe for a delicious soup.
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On 12/29/2010, Tonya said ...
Ugh, I don't think I will be hungry the rest of the day...and I think I am off to find my hairbrush as my head itches.
On 12/29/2010, Kai said ...
BWAHAHAHAHAHA!!! That's right! MAKE me laugh hysterically when I just finished 3 BIG mugs of coffee! That's the funniest post EVER! I was a Campbell's tomato soup fan. Made it with whole milk & real butter, salt & pepper! YUM! And I did eat Pepper Pot - never knew it was tripe! Strangely enough, because I have a Mexican/Taos Pueblo housemate who loves Menudo, also a soup with tripe, AND because I was married for 8 (miserable) years to a West African who introduced me to Egasi - a tripe & okra stew, I have eaten tripe LOTS of times. IF I know for a FACT it's cleaned REALLY, REALLY WELL, I actually LIKE it! And it's CHEAP to buy! LOL! I've never BEEN a huge meat eater, mostly because I just love veggies way more. But I will try ALMOST anything at least once. My best friend saw me preparing chicken gizzards once for a stew & she asked, "Eeeeeeew! Why are you DOING that? Won't the dogs eat it as is?" (Dogs?) Turns out where she was from, dogs were the ONLY ones who ate livers, gizzards, hearts, etc. Woof, woof! Bwahahahaha ... sigh.
On 12/29/2010, Barbara Anne said ...
Never ate it knowingly and never will! No organ meats for us in this house, thank you very much! Ick, shudder, and blech.
The recipe sounds good except for that tripe (see above paragraph!).
You are a veritable fount of lore!!
Hugs!
On 12/29/2010, Debbie said ...
Tripe, tongue, kidney, pig's feet, head cheese...ugh! (Although, I will admit to eating liver!)
On 12/29/2010, Ramey said ...
I loved Pepper Pot soup too, and I don't think I knew it had tripe in it. But, I remember eating and loving fried tripe. Yum, yum. I can even remember eating fried tripe one time when Uncle John was at our house, and we were both pretty pleased with the fare! I can still remember exactly how it tasted. Um, um, um, good stuff!
On 12/29/2010, Gael tino said ...
Looks yummy to me! When I saw the words "pepper", I had to comment that I had black pepper poured all over my toe yesterday at the quilt shop..Pepper stops bleeding, never knew that! Someone left the gaurd off the rotary cutter, it flew off the cutting table and sliced one of my toes! Ouch!
On 12/30/2010, Susan Ramey Cleveland said ...
I can't remembering eating fried tripe. I must have still thought tripe was a fish.
On 12/30/2010, Susan Ramey Cleveland said ...
Well now, come to think of it, in the category of animal innards, I do love chicken livers. Gizzards are too tough, but I think my little sister (Ramey) used to love them.
On 12/30/2010, Susan Ramey Cleveland said ...
I once at a cow's sexual organ. I forget the proper term, but at the particular restaurant they were called Rooster Fries. I didn't know what I had eaten until it was too late. Upon learning that I had not eaten a chicken nugget, I declared, "I'll never be the woman I once was."
On 12/30/2010, Ramey said ...
This is all so funny! Susan, you and I used to fuss over who got the chicken gizzard, and a certain little cousin named Willie T. used to call them "chicken zizzards!"
On 12/30/2010, Jennifer said ...
Oh yuck! I thought tripe was FISH too! LOL, I wonder why that's such a common misconception? The soup does sound delicious, but I'm not touching the tripe!
On 12/31/2010, Susan Ramey Cleveland said ...
I remember that. Even Willie T. calling them zizzards.
On 12/31/2010, Susan Ramey Cleveland said ...
I don't know, Jennifer. Maybe our mamas tell us that so we'll eat it.
On 12/31/2010, Sandra Neel Hutchins said ...
Oh, yuk. No organ meats at our house. Just think, those organs have the job of cleaning out impurities from the animals' bodies. I don't even want to think about what would be in a cow's stomach. Thanks for the informative post, Susan. I never heard of Pepper Pot Soup, so at least I know that I haven't eaten tripe. (We don't eat lunch meat or regular weiners either, because I'm sure all kinds of byproducts go into those things). I'm sure that in by gone days that people had to eat whatever they could get their hands on and be thankful for it, as many still do.
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