Spoof, Red Lead & My Dad's Service in the Royal Canadian Navy
Expect the Unexpected
My father served in the Royal Canadian Navy, sailing the North Atlantic on convoy escort missions during World War II. As a card-carrying Baby Boomer, “the war” was a frequent reference point and topic in my parents’ conversations. Being raised in peaceful times, I viewed “the war” as an event in the past - filed in the archives of history along with the Crusades, the Dark Ages, and the Dinosaur Age.
There were, however, a few remnants of the war that actively impacted my entire childhood: Red Lead and Spoof.
On Sunday mornings, the aroma of red lead and spoof drifted through the house as my mom prepared our favorite family breakfast in the kitchen.
Red lead and spoof were standard food staples served in the mess halls of the Royal Canadian Navy ships that my father called home for four years.
The sailors called stewed tomatoes “red lead” because the juicy reds tasted so good that - even though they all knew better - someone always dished up a second helping. Within minutes… THUD!! The unfortunate sailor felt like he’d eaten a bowl of RED LEAD. As innocuous as stewed tomatoes seemed, they packed a LOT of WALLOP, filling a person up.
I experienced this exact phenomenon several times myself. Time after time, I helped myself to a second serving of red lead. The result was 100% consistent - within minutes, I felt the familiar THUD in my gut. Knowingly, my dad always smiled and said, “That’s why it’s called red lead.”
At least I stood in good company - it was me and all the “red leaders” in the Royal Canadian Navy.
Spoof was in a league all its own. Spoof was the name that Canadian sailors assigned to the canned meat Prem during WWII. Prem was the Canadian equivalent of its US twin, SPAM. Prem and SPAM were standard food fare to all military branches throughout the Second World War.
According to my father, the sailors called it “spoof” because the cooks tried to “Spoof us into thinking we were eating different types of meat. Cookie changed it up, but it was still spoof. Some guys complained a lot, but Cookie could only work with the provisions given to him.”
For simplicity, I will refer to Prem and SPAM as “SPAM” or “spoof.”
SPAM was introduced to the world on July 5, 1937, by Jay Hormel of Hormel Foods, Austin, Minnesota. With the onset of WWII, it became an immediate military food chosen by the powers-to-be. SPAM was cheap, nutritious, filling, easily transported, and it had a shelf life of five years. Wartime world leaders Dwight D. Eisenhower, Margaret Thatcher, and Nikita Khrushchev noted they ate SPAM and acknowledged its importance in sustaining the war effort. The canned meat became an overnight staple both at home and with the troops.
SPAM tends to get a bad rap in the 21st century as it is commonly thought of as poor-quality meat - perhaps one grade above dog food. In fact, nothing could be further from the truth. The stuff is better for you than junk foods and most luncheon meats.
So, what was in this canned meat that became such a resounding success? Ironically, there were only five ingredients in SPAM, making it one of the healthiest sandwich meats on the market.
Chopped pork and ham meat
Salt
Water
Sugar
Sodium nitrate (as a preservative).
SPAM DID NOT contain any additives or fillers. In 2009, Hormel added potato starch to the ingredients to eliminate the gelatin that had previously formed during the cooking process. Still, this is a negligible addition compared to other modern processed foods.
Note: the FDA allows various meat scraps to be added to luncheon meats provided they adhere to the strict guidelines of being “safe for consumption.” Use your imagination to think about what these “meat scraps that are safe for consumption” might include.
Next time you eat a piece of pepperoni sausage on a pizza, a hot dog at a ball game or have a cold meat sandwich, ask yourself if you know what you are REALLY eating. Snouts? Organs? Cheeks? Worse yet…. no, I won’t go there.
Then consider that SPAM contains NO meat scraps.
Hormel has had a longstanding campaign to address misconceptions about SPAM:
Don’t Knock It Until You’ve Tried It.By the end of WWII, Hormel had provided 150 million pounds of SPAM to the war effort. 150 million pounds is a LOT of SPOOF!
It was not known until AFTER the war that military SPAM was a different product than the SPAM sold at home. Domestic SPAM contained 10% ham, but military SPAM contained all pork shoulder meat. Furthermore, military SPAM was canned in 6-pound tins, given extra cooking time, and extra salt was added to help preserve it in the extreme weather conditions where the troops were stationed.
Not only did the military try and pass SPOOF off as different varieties of meat,
but military SPOOF was not even REAL SPOOF, it was FAKE SPOOF!Jay Hormel, President of Hormel Foods, kept a “scurrilous file” of all the hate letters he received from soldiers and sailors about SPAM. They told him they used grease from the canned meat to lubricate their guns, polish their boots, cook other foods, start fires, and prevent rust on metal surfaces. They loathed spoof. What could Mr. Hormel do? Write back and tell them their spoof tasted so bad because it wasn’t genuine spoof? All he could do was file the “hate spoof mail” and work on boosting the domestic sales.
SPAM is now sold in 50 countries worldwide, and it is recognized as an American Icon along with Coca-Cola, McDonald's, and Pizza Hut. On its 75th Anniversary in 2012, sales of SPAM exceeded 8 billion cans. In 2024, SPAM is a major food fundamental, with 7.8 million cans consumed daily.
SPAM has come of age and is served on the menu of the Michelin-starred Noreetuh Restaurant in New York City. No doubt they aren’t serving WWII military SPAM to their patrons! Spoof has come a long way from the mess halls of WWII!
I received a deep appreciation for the life my Dad experienced as a sailor in WWII when he and I visited several “museum” warships together. Dad was a stoker in the engine room, meaning he was one of four men on duty responsible for keeping the ship engines running. It was astounding how small and compact the engine room was - and it was FILLED with huge machinery that would have made a horrendous ROAR when the engines were running. It must have been hotter than blazes in there as well!
The sleeping quarters consisted of four hammocks. Dad said they didn’t need more than that because there were three shifts of four men. One shift was working, one shift was spending time in the mess hall, and one shift was sleeping in the hammocks.
Am I having fun yet? Here’s my spoof and red lead meal. Here’s my hammock. Here’s my work in the scorching hot, roaring loud engine room where I spend eight hours tending to machinery. Over and over and over. When things get interesting, I’m called to Battle Stations, where I place my life on the line. That is, of course, if the 30-foot North Atlantic swells don’t sink the ship first. The sun goes up, the sun goes down and I’m doing my job as a sailor in the Royal Canadian Navy.
My father was on three ships during the war - HMCS St. Croix, HMCS St. Francis, and HMCS Rockcliffe. In 1942, when he joined the Navy, he was assigned to the St. Croix and sent on a convoy escort to Iceland. When the St. Croix returned to Halifax, Nova Scotia, Dad was assigned to the St. Francis.
The St. Croix went on to sail the “Newfie-Derrie” run (St. John’s Newfoundland - Londonderry, Northern Ireland). On September 20, 1943, HMCS St. Croix was torpedoed between Greenland and Iceland at 9:51 PM, and she sank into the icy waters of the North Atlantic six minutes later. Eighty-one survivors spent the frigid night on two life rafts and a half-sunken whaler before they were rescued. 146 men were killed. Given that many of the lost sailors were from Toronto, and so was my Dad, I can only surmise that the sinking of the St. Croix struck close to home for him. However, I don’t recall him ever mentioning the St. Croix getting torpedoed after he was assigned to the St. Francis.
The St. Francis, a Town Class Destroyer, was part of the Newfoundland Escort Force protecting North Atlantic convoys between 1941 and 1943.
In 1944, Dad was assigned to HMCS Rockcliffe, an Algerine Class Minesweeper that sailed in the Western Escort Force as part of the convoy support for the Battle of the Atlantic.
On May 10, 1945, three days after Germany surrendered to the Allies, the RCAF notified the HMCS Rockcliffe about a German submarine moving at 10 knots off the southern coast of Newfoundland. The Rockcliffe captured the surrendered U-boat and escorted it to Shelburne, Nova Scotia.
Dad DID tell me about that adventure. When the men from the Rockcliffe boarded the German U-boat, their interactions were cooperative and cordial. As Dad said, “There were no hard feelings between us. We didn’t have anything personal against each other. We had all just been doing our jobs and were ready to go home.”
As we stand here safe and free,
We wonder why ’twas meant to be
That men should die for you and me.
On all the oceans, white caps flow.
They don’t have crosses row on row.
But they who sleep beneath the sea,
Rest in peace, ’cause we are free.
FREEDOM IS NEVER FREEFREEDOM HAS A HEARTBEAT, IT PULSES THROUGH EVERY VETERAN WHO STOOD TO PROTECT IT .
On this Veteran’s Day, November 11th, thank a veteran for their service. Most of us do not know what it is like to eat military-grade spoof three times a day for four years, share a hammock with three other people, work in extreme temperatures, and endure the threat of enemy attacks 24 hours, 7 days a week. Remember the sacrifice veterans have made of their time and their willingness to put their lives on the line for YOUR freedom.
Personally, I want to extend my thanks and gratitude to my father, Mel Thomson, for the four years he served during WWII on the North Atlantic. There were many in the “Greatest Generation” who fought for our freedom.
Thank you to Jerry Daugherty, Chris & Alma Liotta, Will Holder, Eddie Wright, Ricky Jefus, Shannon Graf, Bruce Hurt, John Applegath, Dale Morris, and many others. If I have not mentioned your name, please forgive me. Your military service is appreciated and valued.
Finally, if you haven’t eaten Spoof recently, consider following Hormel’s suggestion:
Don’t knock it until you’ve tried it! You might be surprised. Do I eat Spoof? I won’t knock it until I’ve tried it.
Who knows, I might be surprised.
Hats off to your dad for his service, Lois! Crazy about those Sunday breakfasts. We lived on Maui and Spam is a big deal there. There's even Spam sushi called—Musubi. I could never bring myself to eat it. But the locals love it.
Loved this story! My uncle may have been in a ship with your Dad’s convoy! Well done!