Son Of Spam

As a cultural observer, I feel I would be remiss if I failed to mention the importance of SPAM in Filipino life.

Yes, SPAM.

Lovely SPAM, wonderful SPAM.

SPAM, SPAM, SPAM, SPAM, SPAM.

Many Filipinos enjoy it as a breakfast meat, but it’s not just for breakfast anymore–you will find it sitting quietly on merienda sandwiches, sometimes sizzled up as an appetizer, or even gracing dinner tables. It’s the "comfort food" that comes in a can; the mystery meat of American pop culture; the stuff of endless satire and parody.

And yes, Filipinos do love it.

What is this pinkish cube of meat that goes by the name of SPAM?

We should start with the name. SPAM, according to my research, was first sold by the Hormel Corporation in the US in 1937. It was meant as a canned sandwich meat that required no refrigeration and could be used to supplement American meals. (Though some evidence points to its development as a portable food weapon against the spread of global communism.) The name "SPAM" is an acronym, as you might guess (I mean, who would actually name a food SPAM? That’s not something you pick out of the air). It took some research – and a number of rudimentary guesses – to figure out what SPAM actually stood for.

Specialty Ham? Space Meat? Stupid People’s Ham?

Turns out it stands for "Spiced Ham." This was the winning entry in the Hormel company’s SPAM-Naming Contest of 1937 (first prize: $100). This also explains the saltiness of SPAM, which has made it the "last choice" of American school lunchboxes for decades (right after pimento loaf) – and incidentally, part of the reason Filipinos love it. Yes, Filipinos do enjoy salty things, especially when mixed with sweet things. Like the aliens of Roswell, they put Tabasco Sauce on everything and prefer their pizzas with sweet tomato sauce. So SPAM provides that wonderful sodium rush that Filipinos seem to crave.

We should also talk about the way SPAM behaves. After fiddling with the crude metal key used to unlock the SPAM canister, the SPAM cube sort of slides out onto a plate with an alien sploosh! It sits there enigmatically, suggesting a pink version of the monoliths in Kubrick’s 2001. What does it mean? What does it want? What does it taste like? What does it go with?

To Filipinos, SPAM goes well with a lot of things, but it is most enjoyed when fried up in half-inch slices and arranged on a plate. Unadorned SPAM is a happy delicacy here. My wife suggests the Filipino fondness for SPAM has its roots in World War II. American GIs were laden down with SPAM rations while stationed here, and they quickly came to hate the pink mystery meat. (In fact, SPAM biographer Carolyn Wyman points out that US soldiers even used SPAM during wartime as a gun lubricant, a skin conditioner, and – I’m not making this up – as thickly-sliced playing cards.)

Of course, innovative Filipinos took to SPAM like ducks to water. Imagine, a meat in a can you didn’t have to cook or refrigerate! Thus SPAM has become one of many unrecorded leftovers from the US days here in the Philippines.

This may explain why Filipino war babies and baby-boomers enjoy SPAM so much – but what about young people? They seem to have inherited the same fervid enjoyment of SPAM. As I said, it’s a "fun food" that turns up on many Filipino dinner and breakfast tables. There could be a kind of postmodern kitschiness to this SPAM fixation. My wife’s Filipina cousin (who lives in the States and has no patience for SPAM) chose to gift me with a SPAM T-shirt a while back (it’s the same shirt I’ve seen Ely Buendia wear onstage with the Eraserheads, though his is black).

SPAM, it turns out, has a proud and unusual history. Nikita Krushchev is said to have credited SPAM with the survival of the Russian Army during WWII. There are SPAM-sculpting contests in the US, and even a SPAM cookbook. SPAM was the subject of a Monty Python sketch (the one where Vikings in a restaurant chant "SPAM, SPAM, SPAM..." to drown out other conversation). And of course, "spamming" is a term used to describe floods of unwanted e-mail, a fact which moved Hormel Corp. to litigate against use of the term. But apparently they’ve decided to live with it, just as the rest of us have.

Clearly, SPAM (which Hormel insists is spelled in capital letters) is more than just a joke. Despite the snide comments, it’s no more dangerous to the human palate than, say, fruitcake. And far from being a "mystery meat," Hormel notes that SPAM’s ingredients are quite innocuous: pork shoulder, ham, salt, sugar, and delicious sodium nitrite.

But whether the Pinoy affection for SPAM is real or ironic, one thing is clear: Filipinos do pack away those little metal cans. Maybe, as with so many other things, they have a sixth sense about the need to store food supplies in times of crisis. And so far, no one has figured out how to send anthrax through those little metal canisters.

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