# Chitlins
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chitlins/413223
**Category:** Cafe Society
**Created:** [July 26, 2007, 1:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chitlins/413223 "2007-07-26T13:49:35Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Rocketeer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rocketeer)
#### Post date: [July 26, 2007, 1:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chitlins/413223/1 "2007-07-26T13:49:35Z")
Last night I thawed and warmed a frozen package of chitlins for dinner. I’d never had them before and was looking forward to a new experience.
I couldn’t eat it; it smelled like vomit. And the texture, oh god, the texture. Like like like, well, I don’t want to say what the texture was like. Like cooked intestines in glue sauce or something.
I can see why it’s a poor folks’ food; no-one with the money to buy anything else would touch them.
Eeeeeyew, ick ick.
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### Author:  [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)
#### Post date: [July 26, 2007, 1:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chitlins/413223/2 "2007-07-26T13:55:43Z")
Like cooked intestines, you say? How surprising.
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### Author:  [@flickster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/flickster)
#### Post date: [July 26, 2007, 3:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chitlins/413223/3 "2007-07-26T15:23:34Z")
I’m not a chitlin fan, but just curious as to what process you were using to cook them.
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### Author:  [@plnnr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/plnnr)
#### Post date: [July 26, 2007, 3:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chitlins/413223/4 "2007-07-26T15:49:32Z")
They certainly are an acquired taste (and smell, and visual). My grandmother fixed them and it took forever - they have to be rinsed and cleaned several times. My father wouldn’t even come in the house when they were being served. “I grew up eating them, but I’ll be damned if I’ll eat them as a grown man.”
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### Author:  [@Rocketeer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rocketeer)
#### Post date: [July 26, 2007, 3:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chitlins/413223/5 "2007-07-26T15:52:16Z")
They were a pre-prepared “boil-in-bag” kind, Uncle Joe’s or some brand like that. I’m not much of a cook–if you can’t fry it, I don’t make it. 😉
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### Author:  [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)
#### Post date: [July 26, 2007, 4:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chitlins/413223/6 "2007-07-26T16:13:14Z")
Could be worse. No cite, but it came up once in another CS thread, that some American subcultures traditionally eat “dirty” chitlins, containing the remains of the pig’s last meal.
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### Author:  [@Wee\_Bairn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wee_Bairn)
#### Post date: [July 26, 2007, 4:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chitlins/413223/7 "2007-07-26T16:24:11Z")
Maybe they’re better if you buy them fresh? I doubt it.
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### Author:  [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)
#### Post date: [July 26, 2007, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chitlins/413223/8 "2007-07-26T16:31:05Z")
[QUOTE=BrainGlutton]
Could be worse. No cite, but it came up once in another CS thread, that some American subcultures traditionally eat “dirty” chitlins, containing the remains of the pig’s last meal.
[/QUOTE]
I find that hard to believe.
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### Author:  [@Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Earl_Snake-Hips_Tucker)
#### Post date: [July 26, 2007, 4:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chitlins/413223/9 "2007-07-26T16:50:53Z")
I had chitlins for the first time as part of a mixed grill at [Las Vacas Gordas](http://www.google.com/maps?hl=en&q=vacas+gordas&near=Miami+Beach,+FL&reviews=1&latlng=0,0,11373736971128582728&sa=X&oi=local&ct=reviews) in Miami Beach. Also included in the meal were a black pudding (blood sausage) and a sweetbread (thymus or pancreas). All three were definitely strong, and very different, tastes–and definitely not for everybody.
But I was OK with it.
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### Author:  [@Yeeter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yeeter)
#### Post date: [July 26, 2007, 9:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chitlins/413223/10 "2007-07-26T21:12:58Z")
You know the old joke:
-How do you prepare chitlins?
-Boil the shit out of 'em.
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### Author:  [@Jodi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jodi)
#### Post date: [July 26, 2007, 9:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chitlins/413223/11 "2007-07-26T21:38:51Z")
[QUOTE=Mangetout]
Like cooked intestines, you say? How surprising.
[/QUOTE]
This gave me my laugh for the day. The Dope earned its half-a-cent daily price from me today. Thank you, **Mangetout**. 🙂
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### Author:  [@Labtrash](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Labtrash)
#### Post date: [July 27, 2007, 12:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chitlins/413223/12 "2007-07-27T00:09:50Z")
I tried chitlins once, just to say I tried them.
Once. Blecch.
When they were cooking, I couldn’t go near that area, the stench was so bad.
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### Author:  [@Patty\_O\_Furniture](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Patty_O_Furniture)
#### Post date: [July 27, 2007, 12:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chitlins/413223/13 "2007-07-27T00:21:32Z")
They tasted much like cooked intestines, _only worse!_
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### Author:  [@flickster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/flickster)
#### Post date: [July 27, 2007, 3:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chitlins/413223/14 "2007-07-27T03:03:36Z")
I’ve even been to the [Chitlin Strut](http://www.chitlinstrut.com/index.html) in Salley, SC - but still have never sampled them.
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### Author:  [@Freudian\_Slit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freudian_Slit)
#### Post date: [July 27, 2007, 3:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chitlins/413223/15 "2007-07-27T03:05:35Z")
Chitlins sound bad enough…but frozen chitlins?
This is worse than the time I found that package of squid chunks in the 99 cents store. (No, I did not purchase said chunks. I merely gaped.)
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### Author:  [@Batsinma\_Belfry](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Batsinma_Belfry)
#### Post date: [July 27, 2007, 5:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chitlins/413223/16 "2007-07-27T05:00:59Z")
My mom tricked me into tasting them once, by telling me they were noodles. I’ve heard the battered and fried ones are better, but I’m thinking it’s only because you can actually eat the batter.
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### Author:  [@irishgirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/irishgirl)
#### Post date: [July 27, 2007, 8:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chitlins/413223/17 "2007-07-27T08:05:48Z")
I’ve had them in Spain, but only as a tapas thingy with a nice sauce. The texture told me what it was, the flavour was fine…again, I think it was the sauce. I wouldn’t cook them, and seeing what boil-in-the-bag can do to perfectly good rice, I’m sure they weren’t improved by that method of preparation.
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### Author:  [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)
#### Post date: [July 27, 2007, 2:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chitlins/413223/18 "2007-07-27T14:28:45Z")
Well, you can live on it, but it taste like shit.
[/Crocodile Dundee]
The texture brings to mind the possibility that I’ve somehow gotten a mouthful of old GoodYear tires.
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### Author:  [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)
#### Post date: [July 27, 2007, 2:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chitlins/413223/19 "2007-07-27T14:30:53Z")
[QUOTE=AHunter3]
Well, you can live on it, but it taste like shit.
[/QUOTE]
No, the boil-in-the-bag anus tastes like shit.
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### Author:  [@pizzabrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pizzabrat)
#### Post date: [July 27, 2007, 2:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chitlins/413223/20 "2007-07-27T14:39:04Z")
The term for traditional rustic fare isn’t “poor folks” food, it’s “peasant” food, and people with money eat peasant food all the time. It’s all the rage during this “foodie” fad that’s sweeping the nation.
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