Amish Country, PA

We took a trip to Lancaster, PA this weekend, and sampled many great Amish delights. First stop was the Bird-in-Hand Farmers Market, where the meat at Hummer's looked so good, we actually went and bought a cooler to take stuff home: scrapple, bacon, Canadian bacon, and sweet Lebanon bologna. We sampled all sorts of other goodies at other market stands like pickles, relishes, jams, pretzels, cinnamon bread, pecan sticky buns and more.




On the side of the road, we saw a sign for homemade root beer, and had to pull in. Down a long drive to a farm where in addition to root beer, they sold whoopie pies and homemade potato chips. The root beer was lightly carbonated and strong and rooty.



The next roadside stand we stopped at was Zook's, home of famous chicken pies. We bought 2 frozen ones, but haven't baked them and tried them out yet. We also stopped at the Kitchen Kettle Village in Intercourse, PA, but it was way too crowded with tourists. Much better was the Intercourse Canning company, where we ate our fill of more pickles, jams, and relishes.

Dinner was at Stoltzfus Farm Restaurant, an all-you-can-eat Amish family-style meal. Starters included chow-chow, applesauce, bread with apple butter, and pickled cabbage. Then the main courses came -- meats included fried chicken, homemade sausage, and Stoltzfus's own homemade ham loaf. The ham loaf was really good - imagine the meatloaf concept, but made with ground ham instead.


The sides included: yams, corn, green beans, buttered noodles, and potato filling. This was my favorite - it was like stuffing but made with potatoes mixed with bread and herbs. It was light and fluffy but deceptively so, as about 20 minutes later all that starch expanded in my gut...

I didn't really have room for dessert, though it was included. 1000yregg got cherry crumb pie, redneckhunter got apple, and I ordered the shoo-fly pie. I love this stuff -- leave it to the Amish to create a pie made entirely of sugar: gooey molasses topped with brown sugar crumb topping. With no other vices but food, you can't blame them for their love of meat, starch, butter and sugar.

Bird-in-Hand Farmer's Market
2710 Old Philadelphia Pike

Stoltzfus Farm Restaurant
Route 772, Intercourse, PA