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I live on spam! Not afraid to say so either. I also live on Jimmey dean’s pork sausage. Ocassionally canned chicken bits, sometimes canned beef bits. Eat it right from the can, cold, hobo style. No cooking, no dishes to wash. A few nibbles every few hours keeps the hunger down to a slight annoyance.
I order from Walmart, get it shipped right to my hobo shack in the swoods. Never leave the house.

THAT does it!

Imma order a case (or two) from Amazon… today!

Crazy TAsty

Mrs Vegetable is Japanese. Many years ago, after we’d moved to the States, she became friends with a lady from Guam, and a lady from Alabama. Somehow SPAM came up in conversation and the ladies were both shocked!! that Mrs Vegetable had never even heard of it.

She came home with a can and asked me, suspiciously, “Why have you never told me about SPAM? This suspicion came about because of the fact I’d discouraged her from eating Twinkies…but somebody gave her one and she was instantly addicted to them. So… was SPAM another forbidden goodie I was keeping from her?

“I’ve worked very hard so we never have to eat SPAM!” I said.

(When I was young my mom viewed SPAM as a sort of “can of last resort” thing. I don’t know why, actually)

” Does it taste bad?” she asked.

Well, I have to be honest about such things so I answered truthfully:

“ No, it actually tastes really good, especially fried with a couple of eggs.

“What’s it made from?”

“Ah, that’s the question”, I replied.

We did try it with fried eggs and I enjoyed it, and she didn’t dislike it, but never asked for it again. I think it’s just a cultural thing that doesn’t translate into Japanese…like peanut butter. She ain’t eatin’ no peanut butter and that’s the end of that.

I never thought about freezing Spam. We usually eat all of it in a day or two. And it’s a staple in our pantry. I’m kinda ashamed to tell you that I just checked: 26 cans of Spam, 20 lg. cans of chicken, and 12 cans of Wolf Brand chili. Canned broth, canned fruits and vegetables and canned milk. And about 20 gallons of drinking water.

Our weather can turn awful so quickly, which means the potential for losing electricity. Yesterday there were wind gusts to 70 mph, and 40K customers lost power in the panhandle. This morning we had rain and huge snowflakes the size of a 50 cent piece—and now the wind is blowing again. JavaMan said we picked up nearly 200 gallons of water into the rain barrels from this morning’s precipitation.

@Some Vegetable — I’ve always thought the can of last resort was Vienna Sausages. Spam is far too nice!

Guide to Spam-like Products
https://spam.budwin.net/

Have I ever mentioned that my husband is a graduate of the Culinary Institute of America? We eat spam. It’s relatively cheap and easily available in my pantry.
Easy quick meal:
Dice spam into small-medium bits. Cook pasta of your choice al dente (I like a tagliatelle). Save a cup of the pasta water. In a skillet add a little bit of oil, a pinch of red pepper flakes and a bit of garlic paste. When you can smell the garlic add the spam. Lightly crisp the spam. Add cherry tomatoes cut in half and a slug of white wine. Add heavy cream and cook down until the sauce is thick. Add in pasta and as much pasta water as needed to get it to desired thickness.
I’ve also been known to make spam and broccoli stir fry, spam and asparagus quiche, spam and mushroom omelettes, cold spam/bellpepper/corn salad, spam stuffed mushrooms, spam egg rolls, spam/cherry tomato/ caramelized onion tart, etc…
Spam is a regular ingredient in our kitchen

My mom would buy one can of spam for 3 kids lunches one day a week. It was a real treat instead of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. Spam and mayo on white bread. Yum! I’m sure everyone knows its popular in the Pacific islands as the military was issued spam during WW2 and they probably did some trading.

When the Imperial Japanese forces withdrew, they confiscated or destroyed every scrap of food, every animal, and every bit of fodder.
When the Allies arrived, they found starving islanders EVERYWHERE. They had SPAM, macaroni, and mayo by the pallet, though.
Many of the Asian versions of tinned meat are pretty good too.

Musubi
Instead of sashimi – spam(fried) with Avocado or Tamagoyaki strapped onto rice using nori.
It appears this started when US troops showed up across the Pacific/Asia and brought Spam to hand out to the locals.

You can get Gochujang flavored spam at Costco, but don’t expect it to have any zing. It’s slightly different flavored but mild. I prefer the smoked or bacon flavored.

But I’m with Someveg, we were kinda taught Spam was for the poor folks, like Scrapple.

Then again, we ate lots of fish and chicken growing up because it was “inexpensive” (meaning poor folks food 😁), not because it was “good for you”.

I make the Musubi, above. The local Korean Hmart sells it and I likes it but it’s pricey. I could buy nice fish to top the sashimi with, but “yankee” where I grew up also meant cheapass. 😋

Crisp thin sliced Spam in a frying pan. Then make SLTs.
SPAM, Lettuce, and Tomato sandwiches. You’ll thank me!

@Uncle Al—the SLT is a favorite in our house. And we use the leftover hamburger buns (buttered and grilled) to make SLTs.
@Armybrat—I wrote down your Spam Pasta recipe 🙂

Golly, but I’m dense! After all these years of making (at different times) both BLTs and SLTs it’s just now dawning on me that there’s no reason in the world not to make BSLTs.

p.s. Please forgive any dup comments. Sweasel’s server and my VPN seem to be at odds today and my earlier attempts at submitting a comment have been rebuffed.

Some Veg, how dare you! Spam is perfectly kosher (I mean, not kosher, but legit). It is chopped pork shoulder cooked in the can.

It’s got a bit of sugar and an emulsifier, but it isn’t fake meat or anything.

Well, grumble, grumble, grumble I’ll concede that SPAM is twenty times as delicious as Vienna Sausage….

Perhaps my inherited bias comes from the legend behind the fortune of a rich uncle on my mother’s side. The story is that he made his fortune by developing a process for commercially skinning pigs using a high pressure air gun and it was especially good at separating the generally wasted bits of meat from the skin.

I got turned onto musubi at a gas station in Anchorage. It was run by Samoans.
Lots of Samoans in Anchorage.

Spam is actually pretty good if you slice it up and soak it a while in hot water to get the extra salt out. The wife won’t touch it, ever. But I kind of like it, especially cubed up and fried with pineapple chunks. OTOH, I also love scrapple, another pork product she considers to be worse than garbage. Because it is garbage; tasty spicy pork bits and fat. Mmm, pork bits and fat. So good.