SPAM in the White House?

[ChrisOC]

I just saw on the news that President elect Obama treated his friends to lunch yesterday, hot dogs and Spam Musubi. Then I realized, he is from Hawaii and probably eats a lot of Spam. I can see a state dinner at the White House with Spam on the menu!

[Bobfrmia]

Obama's love of Spam, to me, means there may be hope for him.
I'll not make this a political thread about how he is just rebuilding the Clinton administration, which flies in the face of the "change" wave that put him in office, and just say, Hey, anyone that loves Spam can't help but have our best interest at heart.

[thew]

change refers to change from the policies of the last 8 years, but it would be nice to have a foodie in the whitehouse, there was a good article 2 weeks ago in the NY times about obama and the foodocentric communities hopes for him, in terms of food policy

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/24/din...

[OCAnn]

You need to be a NYTimes.com member to read the article. Can you post the article in Food Media & News & post a link here? Thank you.

[The Chowhound Team]

Unfortunately, copyright laws prevent us from allowing anything more than a brief quote from an article. It is free to sign up for access to the NYT website, though, if that helps.

[KTinNYC]

If you don't want to register you can always use a username and password from bugmenot.com

http://www.bugmenot.com/view/nytimes.com

[OCAnn]

Chowhound, thank you.

KT, even better. Thank you!

[Siobhan]

I went to a boarding school in Ireland n the 70s and Sunday supper was sliced Spam uncooked or warmed in any way for six years. Have not had it since my years in hell (well it wasn't Jane Eyre but it wasn't Enid Blyton) but I might try it fried soon. Spam let's you survive..,

[jlafler]

I suspect that, like most politicians, Obama is a "when in Rome" kind of guy about food. On the campaign trail, you have to eat a lot of weird and random things, including local specialties that you must enjoy (or pretend to). My guess is that he eats Spam in Hawaii, where it's part of the food culture, but wouldn't serve it in the White House. For that matter, what gets served will probably be left up to Michelle.

[Caralien]

(not a Spam lover, but have eaten it with Hawaiian and Korean friends)
Regarding Spam at the White House...Didn't President Clinton try serving McDonald's once? I know it wasn't a State dinner, but I also recall that it didn't go over well. I highly doubt that Spam would be served for a State dinner, but if that is what he would like to eat, by all means. There are plenty of people who live off of peanut butter or cold cereal, by choice (but will be happy to eat what is served to them by others, and who certainly have enough manners as to eat what they're served)

[chilihead]

I associate spam with family. I grew up sailing around the Great Lakes at every chance that my parents could find. Up through the locks to Lake Superior or island and cove hopping through Lake Michigan. There were always those times when stores would run low, when fish were not caught and when Spam was what was for dinner. This was not a deprivation, it was food, and Mom or Dad fried it, put it between two slices of bread or on some rice and that was all there was. I also have fond memories of deviled ham and instant coffee. While I never think "Hey John and Jeanne are coming over for dinner, I'll just cook up some spam" I do have a few cans in the cupboard in case we're in a pinch.

It’s not bad and it'll last forever, or long enough.

[latindancer]

Yeah....maybe it's that 'it'll last forever' thing and the Frisky's canned catfood smell that makes me feel the way I do about Spam.

[Whosyerkitty]

I don't care what he eats, as long as he fixes the economy, gets us out of the damn war, and implements health care reform. Which I am confident he will do. I am also a fellow Chicagoan, and he's exhibited pretty good taste when it comes to his hot spots for dining, so I think he's got it under control.

And besides, Michelle will plan all that anyway. But be aware that most of us ate Spam (in a weird ketchup based sauce, with instant mashed) sometimes for lunch in Chicago Public Schools.

[chicgail]

amen.

[latindancer]

Well that's one more reason I'm glad I went to a public school where I did. Spam was never on the menu...ever.
However it is all over the place in Hawaii and I choose not to eat it.
I really don't care, like you, what the President, past/present/future, of the United States eats either. As a matter of fact, until I read this thread, I didn't know he'd eaten Spam (so what?) and the media had made such a big deal about it.
I think there are 'bigger fish to fry', so to speak, but the fact remains....I hate the
stuff and apparently so do quite a few others :).

[Whosyerkitty]

Boy, that blows all the crazy nonsense about him being a closet Muslim, as NO Muslim would ever consume Spam.

BUT
Michelle may be a closet Spammer, as she did the CPS. Stay tuned...

[OCAnn]

Nice & interesting observation re spam/chicago public schools/Obama not being Muslim.

[Whosyerkitty]

Thank you.

[Kate is always hungry]

I was born and raised in Chicago. There were no school cafeterias when I went to school there. Had to walk home for lunch everyday. No snow days, either.

[Whosyerkitty]

Really? NS or SS? And WHEN? Because at my grade school you weren't even allowed to go home the last few years. This was in the 70's. They had the crabby lunch ladies with the hairnets and everything. Now I think most of them cater in. The smelly, starchy grade school lunch was $0.32 which is less than I pay now at a Catholic school just for milk because my daughter brings her lunch. No spammy sammies, though.

It's a giant system, but I can't imagine where you went to school. I've never heard of that. I can't remember about snow days then, although now they're unheard of. I just remember the teachers striking a LOT.

Is that why you're always hungry?

[Caralien]

Kate & Kitty:
In the Austin neighborhood of Chicago, no one was allowed to go home for lunch as we ate in the cafeterias, usually brought from home; milk was served at lunchtime, with breakfast for those who qualified. When we moved to La Grange in 1981, it was the same routine (aside from pizza or hot dog day once a month for $1.75). High School had full lunches for purchase, but we'd usually try to sneak off campus at that point.

Never had snow days in the city or the suburbs either; once the school flooded, and we waited 3 hours before being sent home (at which time the generators kicked in).

[BarmyFotheringayPhipps]

I have heard Obama speak approvingly of plate lunch in general and loco moco in particular, so I suspect that he does genuinely like the food of his homeland.

Besides, every time he talks about stuff like that, it makes folks like Cokie Roberts complain about how he vacations in "foreign exotic places," apparently unaware that Hawaii is in fact a US state. So there's entertainment value in that part alone.

[pikawicca]

I love Spam, but eat it rarely, as I try to eat a mostly healthy diet. My sense is that Barack is a bit of a health nut, so suspect that Spam is a rare treat for him, as well.

[Morganna]

I heard there was a photo of him out there in a bathing suit, and he's ripped. :) I bet spam is an occasional treat, too. :) I like spam, though, in its place. Spam, chopped green peppers and onions, with scrambled eggs, topped with cheddar cheese. That was something Daddy learned to love when he was in the Marines and that was what he'd make of a sunday morning when Mom wasn't feeling like making breakfast. :)

[PeterL]

The man promised change, and change he brings.

Besides, he is vacationing in Hawaii.

[cavandre]

Fried Spam on a NYC hard roll...That's a good breakfast.

[chilihead]

White House cuisine has seen stranger.
This is from The Taste of America by John and Karen Hess:

"Day in and day out , Mr. (President) Ford eats exactly the same lunch - a ball of cottage cheese over which he pours a small pitcher of A.1. Sauce, a sliced onion or a quartered tomato and a small helping of butter pecan ice cream. " Eating and sleeping," he says to me, "are a waste of time."

[rednyellow]

Nixon also ate cottage cheese every day. I think it was only Knudsen brand. Bush II did one thing I found cute - when he first came to the white house, or maybe even the place he stayed briefly before moving in, he asked for a cheese burger. He was told they don't serve cheeseburgers. His response was "Yes you do".
If the new President likes spam, Rock on!, serve it.

[ChrisOC]

I meant no disrespect at all. On the contrary, if you check my previous posts, you will see that I am a SPAM lover as well. I was celebrating that fact that formally or informaly, there will no doubt be Spam in the White House.

[chicgail]

Thanks for clarifying that. Posts, like emails, sometimes take on an unintended tone.

Spam for all of us. then!

[chicgail]

I'm going to assume that there was no disrespect intended for our new President-elect by your post.

What one eats casually or for comfort is not likely the same as what would show up at a formal dinner -- at my house, at your house, at Mr. Obama's house. And certainly not at the White House.

Like it or not, it may well be that as the economy worsens, more of us will be dining on Spam.

[latindancer]

Not in a billion years, down-turned economy or not, would I ever eat Spam.

[chicgail]

That's an an interesting response. I am not a spam-eater, but I know it has connotations of being junk, being poor people's food, being unhealthy. Can you say why YOU would never eat spam? Just curious.

[latindancer]

My response has nothing to do with what your perceptions, or anyone else's perceptions, of Spam are. I actually have never thought of Spam the way you're portraying it...'junk food, poor people's food, unhealthy". There is an entire cultural population of Spam eaters that I love and admire for many reasons.
I hate the taste. It's repulsive to me. I've eaten it and I just don't like it.
Does that satisfy your 'curiosity'?

[Passadumkeg]

Mi cunado, we also must put Spam on the bonfire. I've stated before that in a typical military SNAFU we were resupplied on a hill top with 4 palates of Spam, destined for batallion HQ, instead of our usual mixed c-rats. Never again.

Su hermano in Spam
El Passeo

[chicgail]

It does. Thank you for your response.

I know I've tried spam, but I have no clear recollections of what it was like. I do know that I didn't continue to eat it, so maybe I didn't like it either, Maybe I should try it again -- so I know what I am talking about.

[kb8240]

Spam repulses me because the smell is very reminiscent of canned cat food.
But I cannot deny that well done and sliced thin, the flavor is msg good.

[alanbarnes]

Hate to break it to you, but there's no MSG in Spam. Pork, salt, water, sugar, and sodium nitrite - that's it.

[Passadumkeg]

Mmmmmm.......Imagine Spam in an olive drab can with only small black block print on the can. Now imagine a Colt .45 cal slug hitting it dead center. Ooooo, oooo good!

[alanbarnes]

Okay, pork, salt, water, sugar, sodium nitrite, lead, and trace amounts of accelerants.

Does the pressure blow the can, or does the 230 grain FMJ go through-and-through?

[chowser]

My husband was telling me that the Coast Guard did a food drop once in the middle of the ocean (intercepting a ship) and they sent handreds of cans of spam for the passengers. There was some problem with the parachute and it didn't open. They hit the water full force and the cans blew open. He said it looked was an ocean full of spam.

[latindancer]

LOL....the can doesn't tear open and send Spam chunks flying all over the place so the poor, unknowing animals eat it, does it?

[Passadumkeg]

We would leave it for the Viet Cong and hope and pray they would eat it! True story.

[latindancer]

Now that would be one of the better stories I've heard in my lifetime....
The visuals, alone, are remarkable.

[thew]

my cats refused spam

[soypower]

Reminds me of Dr. Seuss' Green eggs & Ham...I will not eat Green Eggs & Ham...

But I would give spam a try..is it really any worse than a hot dog or bologna?

[alanbarnes]

Not only is it not worse, it's actually quite good IMHO.

My favorite way to eat it is sliced relatively thin (1 can = 8 slices) and fried or grill3ed until it's crisp on the outside, alongside a good scoop of medium-grain rice and a couple of sunny-side-up eggs. That's what breakfast tastes like in paradise.

[latindancer]

My breakfast in paradise usually consists of fresh local fruit, bagels and lox and espresso made from beans grown on Kona.
Life is good in paradise.

[OCAnn]

alan, that sounds like the perfect b'fast!

[alanbarnes]

It's pretty good. To be perfect, it has to be eaten on a lanai within earshot of the surf.

[latindancer]

I ate bologna as a child on rare occasions and will have an occasional hotdog as long as it's all beef.
The thought of what goes in to the making of Spam makes me nauseated.
However I love plate lunches...the macaroni salad varies from one restaurant to another and that wonderful rice and that great deep fried mahi mahi.
Wow...watching/photographing competitive surfing championships with a plate lunch tucked securely next to me in the sand?
Nothing could be finer in paradise.

[alanbarnes]

I'm with you on the local fruit. But bagels? Lox? Espresso? Can't go there. I'll meet you halfway with toasted Hawai'ian sweet bread, ahi poke, and brewed coffee from Will & Grace, Moki's Farm, or one of the other small growers. Further than that and we'll have to agree to disagree.

But back to the original topic, what is it that nauseates you about Spam's ingredients? It's just ham and pork shoulder with the simplest of seasonings and curing salt.

[latindancer]

Don't know why the thought of eating Spam makes me sick.
As one who's eaten, with enthusiasm and curiosity, edible insects from all over the world eating Spam, and the memories of those rare occasions when I did it eat, is history.
I'll never do it again.
In my mind why ruin a great bowl of saimin with the addition of Spam?
It's purely a matter of personal taste...

[alanbarnes]

Eat what makes you happy.

Mele Kalikimaka.

[Cathy]

Regular price (at Ralphs in California) is $3.50 for a 12 ounce can. Even on sale it is $2.00 for 12 ounces. Not economical at all...actually, a delicacy in a way.

[OCAnn]

spam musubi...ono home cooking. I think it's awesome that he's opening the culinary eyes of those unfamiliar to foods from other places whether upscale or street/comfort food.

[Deenso]

There's nothing wrong with Spam musubi for lunch, or a nice slice or two of pan-fried Spam alongside your sunny-side-up eggs. Don't knock it 'til you've tried it. But I seriously doubt that our newly elected president will have Spam musubi on the menu at a state dinner. Personally, I really love a snack of skinless and boneless sardines with a little onion and a squeeze of lemon, but would I serve this to dinner guests at a formal sit-down? A little credit, please, for Mr. Obama.

[Davwud]

I don't recall hearing Jr. serve beef ribs and brisket at a state dinner for that matter either.

DT