Spam (its name a portmanteau of the words “Spiced” and “Ham”) is a canned precooked meat product made by the Hormel Foods Corporation, first introduced in 1937. The labeled ingredients in the classic variety of Spam are chopped pork shoulder meat, with ham meat added, salt, water, modified potato starch as a binder, and sodium nitrite as a preservative. Spam’s gelatinous glaze, or aspic, forms from the cooling of meat stock. The product has become part of many jokes and urban legends about mystery meat, which has made it part of pop culture and folklore. Through a Monty Python sketch, in which Spam is portrayed as ubiquitous and inescapable, its name has come to be given to electronic spam, including spam email.
In 2007, the seven billionth can of Spam was sold. On average, 3.8 cans are consumed every second in the United States.
Spam is typically sold in cans with a net weight of 340 grams (12 ounces). A 100-gram (3.5-ounce) serving of original Spam provides 1,300kJ (310 Calories or kilocalories), 13 grams of protein (26% DV), 3 grams of carbohydrates (1% DV), 27 grams of total fat (41% DV), including 10 grams of saturated fat (49% DV). The cholesterol content of Spam is 70 milligrams (23% DV). A serving also contains 57% of the recommended daily intake of sodium (1369 milligrams). Spam provides the following vitamins and minerals: 0% vitamin A, 1% vitamin C , 1% calcium, 5% iron, 3% magnesium, 9% potassium, 12% zinc, and 5% copper.
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| Spam advertisement on back cover of Time magazine on May 14, 1945. |
There are several different flavors of Spam products, including:
*Spam Classic – original flavor
*Spam Hot & Spicy – with Tabasco flavor
*Spam Less Sodium – “25% less sodium”
*Spam Lite – “33% less calories and 50% less fat” – made from pork shoulder meat, ham, and mechanically separated chicken
*Spam Oven Roasted Turkey
*Spam Hickory Smoke flavor
*Spam Spread – “if you’re a spreader, not a slicer … just like Spam Classic, but in a spreadable form”
*Spam with Bacon
*Spam with Cheese
*Spam Garlic
*Spam Golden Honey Grail – a limited-release special flavor made in honor of Monty Python’s Spamalot Broadway musical
*Spam Mild
*Spam Hot Dogs
In addition to the variety of flavors, Spam is sold in tins smaller than the twelve-ounce standard size. Spam Singles are also available, which are single sandwich-sized slices of Spam Classic or Lite, sealed in retort pouches.
As of 2003, Spam is sold in 41 countries worldwide, sold on six continents and trademarked in over 100 different countries.
In the United States in the aftermath of World War II, a troupe of ex-G.I. women was assembled by Hormel Foods to promote Spam from coast to coast. The group was known as the Hormel Girls and associated the food with being patriotic. In 1948, two years after the group’s conception, the troupe had grown to 60 women with 16 forming an orchestra. The show went on to become a radio program where the main selling point was Spam. The Hormel Girls were disbanded in 1953. Spam is still quite popular in the United States, but is sometimes associated with economic hardship because of its relatively low cost.
The residents of the state of Hawaii and the territories of Guam and the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI) consume the most Spam per capita in the United States. On average, each person on Guam consumes 16 tins of Spam each year and the numbers at least equal this in the CNMI. Guam, Hawaii, and Saipan, the CNMI’s principal island, have the only McDonald’s restaurants that feature Spam on the menu. In Hawaii, Burger King began serving Spam in 2007 on its menu to compete with the local McDonald’s chains. In Hawaii, Spam is so popular it is sometimes referred to as “The Hawaiian Steak”. One popular Spam dish in Hawaii is Spam musubi, where cooked Spam is combined with rice and nori seaweed and classified as onigiri.
Spam was introduced into the aforementioned areas, in addition to other islands in the Pacific such as Okinawa and the Philippine Islands, during the U.S. military occupation after World War II. Since fresh meat was difficult to get to the soldiers on the front, World War II saw the largest use of Spam. G.I. started eating Spam for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. (Some soldiers referred to Spam as “ham that didn’t pass its physical” and “meatloaf without basic training”.) Army soldiers commonly refer to SPAM as Special Army Meat due to its introduction during the war. Surpluses of Spam from the soldiers’ supplies made their way into native diets. Consequently, Spam is a unique part of the history and effects of U.S. influence in the Pacific.
The perception of Spam in Hawaii is very different from that on the mainland. Despite the large number of mainlanders who consume Spam, and the various recipes that have been made from it, Spam, along with most canned food, is often stigmatized on the mainland as “poor people food”. In Hawaii, similar canned meat products such as Treet are considered cheaper versions of canned meat than Spam. This is a result of Spam having the initial market share and its name sounding more convincing to consumers.
In these locales, varieties of Spam unavailable in other markets are sold. These include Honey Spam, Spam with Bacon, and Hot and Spicy Spam.
In the CNMI, lawyers from Hormel have threatened legal action against the local press for running articles decrying the ill-effects of high Spam consumption on the health of the local population.
Spam that is sold in North America, South America, and Australia is produced in Austin, Minnesota, (also known as Spam Town USA) and in Fremont, Nebraska. Austin, Minnesota has a restaurant with a menu devoted exclusively to Spam, called “Johnny’s SPAMarama Menu”.
In 1992, SPAM Lite was introduced, and in 2001, SPAM Oven Roasted TURKEY was introduced.
Spam is celebrated in a small local festival in Austin, Minnesota, where Hormel corporate headquarters are located. The event, known as Spam Jam, is a carnival-type celebration that coincides with local Fourth of July festivities, featuring parades and fireworks that often relate to the popular luncheon meat. Austin is also home to the Spam Museum, and the plant that produces Spam for most of North America and Europe. In addition to the periodic celebration, there is a national recipe competition where submissions are accepted at the top forty state fairs in the nation.
Hawaii also holds an annual version of Spam Jam in Waikiki during the last week of April.
The small town of Shady Cove, Oregonis home to the annual Spam Parade and Festival, with the city allocating $1500 for it.
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| Spam musubi (Hawaii) |
The Spam Jam is not to be confused with Spamarama, which is a yearly festival held around April Fool’s Day in Austin, Texas. The theme of Spamarama is gentle parody of Spam, rather than straightforward celebration: the event at the heart of the festival is a Spam cook-off that originated as a challenge to produce an appetizing recipe for the meat. The festival includes light sporting activities and musical acts, in addition to the cook-off.
Here’s the link to the Spam web site:
http://www.spam.com/
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