Chitlins are offal. Pig intestines, to be precise. When eating swine from the rooter to the tooter, they are as low on the hog as you can go. They joined the American diet as African slaves’ food, while masters ate hams and pork chops from high on the hog. Unlike many other once lowly dishes that have gradually been elevated to culinary stars (lobster, barbecue, bread made from coarse-ground flour), chitlins, formally known as chitterlings, remain uncouth. They are savored by few, prized by some proud poor whites as well as blacks because they are so symbolic of culinary humility, but they are a taste that many who did not grow up with them find very difficult to acquire. There are a number of well-attended chitlin festivals around the country (the foremost being in Salley, South Carolina), at which the in-your-face food is honored with the same mischievous pride found at festivals that celebrate such love-it-or-hate-it fare as ramps, pickled eggs, and fried testicles.
Particularly malodorous when being cooked, chitlins frequently are deep-fried, a process that tends to mask their intestinal essence. Through a wide swatch of southernmost Virginia, however, they are steamed in vinegar, the tang of the liquid serving as a kind of palate cleanser. Needless to say, given chitlins’ point of origin, they are a food that must be cleaned extremely well before being cooked and eaten.