Drudge Retort: Red Meat for Yellow Dogs
Thursday, May 21, 2009

I understand that some of us have since moved on to the finer things in life like free KFC grilled chicken and such, but who else grew up having to eat Spam when times got a little rough?

I can't be the only with a mom who fried up the spam in a pan and dressed it up with cheese (American, of coursego USA), toasted bread and some ketchup and called it a "Spam burger." You know, to make you forget that you have no idea what Spam is and why you're eating it.

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lipzoidial

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my mom used to make a "hash" type dish with cubed spam, cubed potatoes, diced onions fried and you had to smother it with plenty of ketchup - i tried to recreate it ONCE with my own as they were curious about the mystery meat - it ended up in the dog's dish and i cannot remember if the dog ate it.

we were a poor to middle class family most of my life, but we didn't know it as we were too busy out building treehouses, doing neighbor's yard work for small change and spending time at the ocean with sack lunches. my dad worked for a large transit system so we had free bus passes and would travel all over the city on adventures.

there weren't many days or nights you could rope five of us down in front of a television!

Mmmm, Spam and eggs for breakfast. Rite Aid has Spam on sale all of the time. Beer is really cheap there as well.

I don't know people are bitching about.

I am making the same amount of money and everything is on sale.

Been to HomeDepot lately? Tons of room and Sales signs everywhere. Materials are cheap.

My first meal in the Army was listed on the Mess Hall's Menu as "Turkey A'la King"-it turned out to be Spam Soup.


Spam and eggs for breakfast.

#2 | Posted by 101Chairborne


101, tsk, tsk. Anyone can make spam and eggs, but what about spam, spam, spam, spam, eggs and spam? hmm?

My wife drinks that damn wine in a box. I am ashamed to buy it, but if you do the math, it's actually pretty cheap on a cost per buzz basis.

My favorite Fred Sanford (redd foxx) line; 'I mixed Bourgeois Lai (sp??) with Ripple and I got Booze-Your-Lipple'.

My wife drinks that damn wine in a box.

#5 | Posted by Lipzoidial

Mine too. You know, they just drink that shit so you can't tell how much they go through. It always looks like the same box is sitting there.

(She's probably gonna stop talking to me for a while if she reads this post)

We once took the wine in a box out of the box (big plastic liner) and snuck it into a Journey concert back in the late 70's.

champagne and ripple = champipple!

Boones Farm!

I'm back hooked on baloney and ketchup sandwiches. Not so much financial as unless you go with the expensive or fatty stuff, most sliced meat tastes the same anyways.

Communist. Everyone knows you put mustard on bologna sandwiches.

I understand that some of us have since moved on to the finer things in life like free KFC grilled chicken and such, but who else grew up having to eat Spam when times got a little rough?

Mom didn't buy spam because things were always rough when she was raising my brother, sister and myself. There were some weeks when we'd have one of the various flavors of Hamburger Helper for dinner every night of the week.

Lunch was potted meat sandwiches. Know those tiny cans of potted meat? Mom could make one last a week for four people.

My brother and I mowed lawns to pay for our private school, buy our clothing and help with the bills. When we were old enough, we go jobs. At one point for about 2 years, I had 2 jobs. One mopping floors in a gas station and the other working in a welding shop being a helper.

Communist. Everyone knows you put mustard on bologna sandwiches.

I work with a guy who puts Grape Jelly on his bologna sandwich.

but who else grew up having to eat Spam when times got a little rough?

We went through a period of several years that we ate spam -- once or twice a week! The rest of the week we ate beans and rice and whatever came out of our garden -- usually okra, peppers, tomatoes, and a lot of figs in the summer. My mother canned or froze the surplus.

My dad had gotten laid off just after buying a new house and my mother just getting pregnant with her fourth child. We took on several paper routes that the whole family participated in. Funny thing is that no one really bitched about it. If my parents did, it was never around us kids. We just did what we had to do.

Of course back then kids didn't have to wear $200 sneakers and jeans to go to school. We actually rode bikes to school even though we had a driver's licence (just no car! lol) I can't imagine today's youth accepting that sort of lifestyle.

who else grew up having to eat Spam when times got a little rough?

Growing up wasn't so bad but we spent a winter in the early 80's eating nothing but poached deer and ramon noodles.

I agree that a baloney sandwich needs ketchup, it also needs a slice of cheese.

Grape jelly goes with a ham sandwich.

Ahhhh,the spam beckons,
Don't you want to swallow me,
Promise not to hurt.

dxlingr

Some other gems from
web.mit.edu

5129.
Cold steel in a pig.
Clean up the blood, cook the flesh:
A pig in cold steel.
--John Mitchell, jam@altagroup.com

5144.
I stare, it stares back.
I long to know its feelings.
It demurs. Lunch, then.
--Drew Scott

5172.
I stepped from shadows
Into the microwave glow
And watched SPAM rotate
--Tom Elliott, tosh@werple.net.au

5228.
SPAM, it's a short word
Takes a moment to say the
Monosyllable
--Tom Elliott, tosh@werple.net.au

5311.
Locked in room with SPAM
Try to pick lock with can's key
It snaps, I am doomed
--Tom Elliott, tosh@werple.net.au

5345.
A bulge in my jeans
"Is that SPAM in your pocket?"
I blush and say "Yes"
--Tom Elliott, tosh@werple.net.au

5365.
Simmer in saucepan
SPAM mixed with herbs and spices
Throw out meat, eat pan
--Tom Elliott, tosh@werple.net.au

5445.
Sitting on toilet
I think of the SPAM long gone
And SPAM yet to come
--Tom Elliott, tosh@werple.net.au

5488.
In the can of SPAM
A severed human finger
Pleasant texture change
--Tom Elliott, tosh@werple.net.au

Grape jelly goes with a ham sandwich.

How about a ham, peanut butter, and lettuce sandwich? This is on this menu from a San Diego diner ca 1930.


i239.photobucket.com

How about a ham, peanut butter, and lettuce sandwich?

That doesn't sound right. I've never tried but lettuce and peanut butter don't sound like something that should be mixed.

Neat old-school menu, Goat. Which Fox did it come from?

Whatsleft: I've never had straight lettuce and peanut butter, but the chicken cooked with chopped peanuts and peanut sauce/oil served alongside lettuce leaves at most Thai joints is damn tasty.

It's a menu from a diner.

My grandfather was a Grapes of Wrath guy during the depression. He rode the rails from Oklahoma to S California to pick fruit and work in a diner. If you read the scribblings, you'll see they are well wishers bidding my grand dad adieu before he went back to OK. Year was 1930. When he died, my dad found it in his stuff along with a bunch of pictures. He let me scan them.

I have the other three pages on line too. Look for the links in a few minutes after this post. One page has a Tbone steak dinner for 60c

i239.photobucket.com

i239.photobucket.com

i239.photobucket.com

Note the phone numbers on the back. 2 and 3 digits.

That's awesome. It's the small, seemingly random keepsakes that really give you the best idea about your relatives. When my grandfather died, my aunt gave me his old Bible from when he was a kid growing up in Italy. The doodles in the margins are priceless.

I used to take and open up a can of SPAM(Shoulder Pork and hAM) and take a drill bit and drill a 3/8ths inch hole in dead center about an inch and half deep and then procede in taking a turkey baster about a 1/4 full of either A1 or Heinz 57 sauce and inject it into the SPAM and let set overnight in a sandwich baggie and I would have that along with either egg sandwiches or whatever was handy. Good times.


Larry

I just read through those menus; the coolest thing is that, outside of the price change, I've seen almost the exact same menu items at a good number of hole-in-the-wall Southern eateries that I've been going to since I was a kid.

"then procede in taking a turkey baster about a 1/4 full of either A1 or Heinz 57 sauce and inject it into the SPAM and let set overnight in a sandwich baggie"

Jesus. Leave it to good 'ole American ingenuity.

I'm inspired, however. Maybe I'll make a puree of SPAM, green onions, and horseradish and inject that into a bacon-wrapped scallop.

Or something.

If you eat Spam have Beano for dessert.

I've seen almost the exact same menu items at a good number of hole-in-the-wall Southern eateries that I've been going to since I was a kid.

Even the sardine sandwich and jelly omelet? *grin* Grapefruitade sounds kind of good. I've never had it.

Unlike the food of today, though, I'll bet all that stuff was never frozen (except the ice cream, of course) and that they made their lemonade from scratch or even to order.

"Even the sardine sandwich and jelly omelet?"

OK, not so much that one...WTF is a jelly omelet anyway?

I might have to play around with a grapefruitade recipe. I found this one on a simple Googling: www.marthastewart.com

Of course it contains alcohol, so that may be the key ingredient.


There's something here and I can't put my finger on it.

I've been on this site for about 2 years now and I am just now learning something I didn't know before.

Your voices, the ones I can now almost connect a mind to, the ones that I would classify as independent and moderate, tell me that you guys came from a similar world as the one I came from.

Poor economically but not poor of spirit and not poor of mind. This somehow seems important, because I think this is the real America. Not every poor kid gets to make it (out of being poor), but somehow, all of us did make it out. And the best part is that we all retained the toughness of mind that only poverty can bring.

So, today, On a holiday Friday, I raise my glass of cheap wine in toast to all you that learned the most valuable lesson of life; money is not everything.

Cheers

#29 | Posted by Lipzoidial

things do not create happiness - things accompany happiness - CHEERS!

although i have vowed to eat tree bark before i'll ever eat spam again.

although i have vowed to eat tree bark before i'll ever eat spam again.

#30 | Posted by nanc

I could probably handle Spam if I didn't have to see, or even know about that gloppy, gross stuff that slides out of the can with it.

#31 | Posted by SanAntonioRogue

WHAT is that stuff? it has the consistency of baby snot...hey, you don't think...nah, can't be...


The deep, dark truth about Spam. Also some nifty trivia. Impress your friends and relatives!

Ingredients:

Chopped pork shoulder meat with ham meat added.
Salt (for binding, flavour, and firmness)
Water (to help in mixing)
Sugar (for flavour)
Sodium Nitrite (for colour and as a preservative)
Yum yum!


Nutrition Information For SPAM (original style):

Calories Per Serving: 170
Calories Per Serving From Fat: 140
Serving Size: 2 oz.
Servings Per Container: 6 (large) or 3.5 (small)
Total Fat: 16g
Saturated Fat: 6g
Cholesterol: 40mg
Sodium: 750mg
Total Carbohydrates: 0g
Fiber: 0g
Sugars: 0g
Proteins: 7g
Vitamin A: 0%
Vitamin C: 0%
Calcium: 0%
Iron: 2%
Deee-licious!

Nifty Spam Trivia!

By World War II, Hormel had sold twenty thousand tons of Spam. Then, during the wartime meat rationing, Spam got popular...

If all the cans of Spam ever eaten were put end-to-end, they would circle the globe at least ten times.

In the U.S. alone, 3.8 cans of Spam "are consumed every second"(assuming SPAM is eaten 24 hours a day, 365.25 days a year).

Senator Robert Byrd of West Viginia eats a sandwich of SPAM and mayonnaise on white bread three times a week.

Residents of Hawai'i eat an average of four cans of SPAM per person per year, more than in any other place on Earth (Elsewhere in the Universe, who knows?).

By 1959, a billion cans of SPAM had been sold. The two billion mark was hit in 1970, followed by three billion in 1980, four billion in 1986, and five billion in 1993. That's a lot of SPAM!

In Korea, SPAM is sold in stylish presentation gift boxes of nine cans each. SPAM stolen from army PXs can be found on the Korean black market. And there are Korean imitations called Lo-Spam, Dak, Plumrose, and Tulip, to ensure that no one need go without.

Nikita Krushchev once credited SPAM with the survival of the WWII Russian army. ''Without SPAM, we wouldn't have been able to feed our army,'' he said.

SPAM is sold in over 99% of U.S. grocery stores. The SPAM luncheon meat trademark is registered in 93 countries.

Over 60 million people in the U.S. eat SPAM.

SPAM is made in two U.S. locations - Austin, Minnesota, and Fremont, Nebraska - and seven other countries: England, Australia, Denmark, Phillipines, Japan, Taiwan, and South Korea.

In 1989, the U.S. armed forces bought 3.3 million pounds of SPAM.

Over 141 million cans of SPAM are sold worldwide each year.

"If all the cans of Spam ever eaten were put end-to-end, they would circle the globe at least ten times."

And if all of the Spam ever fully digested was put end-to-end, it would stretch from the kitchen table to the bathroom once.

this reminds me of a balogna story.

Calories Per Serving: 170

i'll take mine in a snickers bar, please.

please don't put up a post on vienna sausages.

Yeah, I had to drop the Chateau Lafite and go to Dom Perignon. Bummer.

although i have vowed to eat tree bark before i'll ever eat spam again.

#30 | Posted by nanc

I'm not interested anymore either but years ago Spam was one of the best breakfasts I ever had, fried over a camp fire.

I don't believe that in Hawaii they eat only 4 cans of SPAM per person per year. That is only one can per three months. No way they eat that little. I thought they would eat about 4 cans per week.

I don't believe that in Hawaii they eat only 4 cans of SPAM per person per year. That is only one can per three months. No way they eat that little. I thought they would eat about 4 cans per week.

It doesn't go good with poi.

I don't mind Spam but the price per pound ain't cheap. Luckily the local Sav-Mart runs specials on eggs - last week an 18 pack for $1.50. I used to like beef liver as a cost cutter but nowadays it's as expensive as 80% lean hamburg.

But what real grinds my gears is thanks to a certain group of illegals that shall remain anonymous beef tongue, tripe and soup bones aren't cheap anymore.

Well there's always rice, beans, potatoes, generic breads and bananas.

But what real grinds my gears is thanks to a certain group of illegals that shall remain anonymous beef tongue, tripe and soup bones aren't cheap anymore

I love the tacos de lengua which are quite popular in San Antonio and -- as you say -- are responsible for the high price of tongue.

The same thing was true about skirt steak. 30 years ago it was the 'trash' cut of beef and the cheapest. Then someone invented fajitas and there went cheap skirt steak.


The price of meat curtains has gone up too.

I wouldn't know Lipzoidial didn't rastaninja say his going "donation" was $30?

Spam is huge in Hawai'i.

It's even served at McDonald's in Honolulu.

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