For over 12 years you’ve counted on SSHAM to satisfy your spicy-shrimped-salted-ham cravings. What started as an accident in the kitchen of our founder, Art Pua’a, has become the world’s fastest selling canned meat product. Our “Tell us what you do with your SSHAM” campaign has been a huge success thanks to you. With your help, we’ve collected tens of thousands of recipes, crafts, and home ideas. SSHAM awareness has spread to every corner of the globe. You’ve truly helped to make SSHAM “The meat of 1,000 uses,” but SSHAM Stories isn’t about us. It’s about you.
SSHAM Stories are your stories. It’s a place that lets you share all the special moments in your day with your friends and family. Let everyone know how SSHAM has touched you in a special way. Stories can be synced with all your favorite social media sites and your Ceremplant. We’ve made it easy to attach pictures and video to help you tell your tales. Whether it’s a craft idea, a humorous event, a cooking tip, or even a joke, we know you have a great SSHAM story to share.
You can read heartfelt stories about how SSHAM brought families together like the one MikeM shares below.
My teenage years were complicated, and not in a good way. I dropped out of school my Junior year, and my parents were ready to ship me off to an institutional learning facility. Before they sent me away, my Grandfather offered to take me in over the summer and try to straighten me out. I was not a huge fan of this plan. When he woke me up at 4:00am the first morning I just knew that it wasn’t going to work out. We drove to the docks and right up to an old busted sailboat on a trailer. As we backed up towards it I asked, “What is that thing?” My Grandpa answered, “Our summer project.”
Every morning we got up at the crack of dawn and pulled out rotten boards. I scraped barnacles and years of dried ocean debris from the hull until I thought my arms would fall off. We talked a lot too. Grandpa told me what it was like when he moved to Lahaina. He told me stories about my dad that I didn’t know, and he talked a lot about my Grandma. Before long I started talking too. I remember the first time he didn’t have to wake me up, and the first time I got up before him and made us breakfast. I didn’t know what he was grinning at that morning but I do now. When it was finally all done he shared a secret with me, SSHAM polish. “It’s the best thing for a boat. Keeps barnacles away and helps waterproof wood.” I couldn’t believe how good it looked.
Grandpa passed away that night before we had a chance to take the Shits-N-Giggles out for her maiden voyage. I still use the SSHAM polish on her before every trip and remember the other life lessons he taught me. I won’t lie, it attracts a lot of seabirds, but the time I spend scrubbing her off gives me time to think about the greatest man I ever met, my grandfather.”
Occasionally we learn about SSHAM being used in some amazing ways. BrianT writes with one such surprising story.
I’d only been working at the new Vereserum facility for a week as a research assistant when Dr. Reemer asked me to change out the biofilters in Lab B. When I went to the storeroom and found that we were all out of cartridges my heart sunk. Even though it wasn’t my job to make sure everything was stocked, I knew I’d get yelled at. I worried that I might get bumped down to a less important project. One of the other assistants must have seen the trouble in my eye and asked what was wrong. I explained the problem to her and she just smiled. “Let me show you a trick,” she said.
She told me that they were always running out of filters but a couple thick slices of SSHAM worked just as well. I stared at her in disbelief as she opened a can, cut off a hunk, and put it in place. “It’s texture is perfect for filtering out any pollutants and it contains enough useful bacteria to degrade most contaminants. It’ll make the place smell a little funny, but it works just as good as the cartridges. It’ll even kill off MRSA bacteria,” she told me. She closed the panel and left just before Dr. Reemer walked in. He sniffed the air and looked at me, “I see they showed you the SSHAM trick,” he said and began checking the petri dishes. I became a lifelong SSHAM fan that day.
Others have told us how SSHAM turned out to be the solution to impossible problems. MeaganH writes with this tale of a wedding reception almost gone wrong.
The hall called my sister in the middle of her daughter’s wedding. The caterer had not shown up and we were supposed to be there in less than an hour. We slipped out as quietly as we could and headed to the hall. We brainstormed some ideas and cursed the caterer on our way. The hall manager felt bad for us and offered to let use their full service kitchen if we wanted to try and whip something up instead of ordering pizza. Then I remembered your SSHAM recipe page. We made a list of the ingredients we’d need for the top 5 recipes and instructed the staff to open the bar early while we rushed off to save the dinner.
Things were already starting to get rowdy by the time we got back and I was worried that another 1-2 hours of people drinking on an empty stomach would be a disaster. Luckily, your recipes were fast, easy, and most importantly, delicious. A little over 2 hours after we slipped out of the church, we served our first dish. Is was a huge success! You wouldn’t believe how fast the food went. I was concerned that the SSHAM tortilla pie might be too messy, but nobody seemed to care about spilling food. Even those who found it to difficult to walk at the time asked for a second plate. I’m sure many there that night have trouble remembering what happened, but I’ll never forget how SSHAM saved the day!”
These are just a few examples of the testimonials you can find or share. SSHAM Stories are your stories. We look forward to hearing them all.
