Puncture Your Can Of Spam For Easier Removal, Every Time
It's Saturday morning, and the house already smells like someone's hard at work in the kitchen. There's the smell of frying eggs, hot buttered toast, and ... is that ham? No, it smells like bacon. Or is that pork? You head into the kitchen and find your mother cutting off slices of meat from a small pink cube on the counter. It's Spam, the meaty preserved treat that is found with everything, from eggs to rice.
The origins of this geometric hunk of wonder meat go back to 1937 when, as Eater explains, the Hormel Foods Corporation began to experiment with ways to create a non-perishable "meat item" alongside dealing with a surplus of pork shoulder. By combining pork shoulder, water, salt, sugar, and preservatives — as well as potato starch later in the process — Hormel created a preserved cube of pork, which would become known as "SPAM." Although what exactly "spam" means is up for debate, with Mental Floss suggesting that it may be an acronym of the words "Shoulder of Pork And Ham," it can't be denied that this cube of luncheon meat has found itself an audience in the homes of people not just in the United States, but in places like the Philippines too (via SBS Food).
One issue with Spam, however, is that it's sometimes hard to get the meat out of its tin. Fortunately, busting a hole or two in your tin of Spam meat can help you get it out easier.
Puncturing the can helps decrease pressure
You crack open your tin of Spam, ready to fry it up alongside some eggs, only to discover that it won't slide out. You try to wriggle your knife between the meat and the tin itself to loosen it, but you mostly just break the Spam block into wet pink clumps instead of one solid brick. Perhaps if you had used that knife to break a hole in the can, getting the Spam out wouldn't be so hard.
As Foods Guy explains, simply take your knife and poke a hole in the bottom of the can before you open it. Then, open the can and watch the Spam fall out in one perfectly solid piece. This is because the Spam is vacuum-sealed inside the can, and the huge amount of pressure keeps it firmly in place. By poking a hole in the tin, some of that pressure can escape and loosen the Spam inside. Think of it like shaking a can of Coke, then poking a hole in the side to let all the carbonated pressure escape.
According to Made How, both the can and the meat itself are "vacuum-sealed" to ensure freshness and to prevent the meat from losing too much of its juices. The only thing worse than a broken brick of Spam would almost certainly be a dry, flavorless bite of Spam.
You can also get your Spam out with some hot water
If you don't feel comfortable stabbing a hole in your can of Spam but still want to get it out in one piece, you needn't worry. There are a few easy ways to get your Spam out that won't involve taking a knife to your processed lunch meat.
If you take the advice of Diary of an Adi, all you need to do is run the bottom of the can under warm water for roughly 30 to 60 seconds. The warm water will help to melt any sticky clumps of fat that may be holding the meat to the inside of the can. After giving your can of Spam a quick bath, the meat should easily be able to slide out onto your plate. It is advised, however, to use warm water rather than hot water.
Another simple method comes from Kitchen Seer, which effectively boils down to squeezing the can. Open the can as you usually would, and then flip it upside-down. Gently but firmly press both sides of the can before giving the bottom of the can a few firm taps. This should help loosen up some of that pressure and allow the Spam to simply slide out of its tin.
If you love Spam — perhaps as much as one certain couple does — you'll find these methods to be a lifesaver when it comes to taking Spam out of its can.