Opening a can of meat might seem like a quick mealtime solution, but not all canned proteins deserve a spot in your pantry. Some canned meats pack unhealthy levels of sodium, preservatives, and mystery ingredients that would make even your stomach raise an eyebrow.
Let’s crack open the truth about which canned meats deserve the side-eye and which ones should be banned from your shopping cart altogether.
1. Spam (The Original)
Mystery meat in a blue can? Hard pass! Spam contains a whopping 790mg of sodium per serving—that’s 33% of your daily limit in just a few bites.
The ingredient list reads like a chemistry experiment with sodium nitrite linked to increased cancer risk.
2. Vienna Sausages
Tiny tubes of terror! These pale finger-sized meat cylinders float in a suspicious jelly that should immediately trigger your food danger radar.
Made from mechanically separated chicken, beef, and pork, they’re loaded with sodium nitrite and MSG. One can contains more sodium than two large orders of fast-food fries!
3. Potted Meat Product
What exactly is “potted meat product” anyway? Nobody really knows!
This mysterious paste contains chicken, pork, beef hearts, and mechanically separated chicken—basically whatever scraps were left on the factory floor.
4. Deviled Ham Spread
Wrapped in that iconic paper packaging lurks a salty, mushy mixture that barely resembles meat. One serving packs a shocking 480mg of sodium!
The processing destroys any nutritional value while preservatives keep it “fresh” for an unnaturally long time. The devil is truly in these details—and in this can.
5. Canned Corned Beef Hash
Breakfast crime scene alert! This mushy mix of diced potatoes and mystery beef bits swims in enough grease to lubricate a car engine.
Most brands pack a whopping 970mg of sodium per serving. The meat quality? Let’s just say it wouldn’t pass a visual inspection if you saw it before processing.
6. Canned Chicken
Shredded chicken shouldn’t splash when you open the can! This waterlogged poultry comes packed in so much liquid it’s practically drowning.
The texture resembles wet paper and tastes like chicken that’s had all its flavor surgically removed.
7. Luncheon Meat
The generic cousin of Spam somehow manages to be even worse! This mystery meat block contains more fillers than actual animal protein.
With sky-high sodium levels and questionable meat sources, it’s basically a salt lick shaped into a loaf. Hard pass!
8. Canned Chili With Meat
Meat chunks floating in red goo? Not appetizing! The “meat” in these cans often contains textured vegetable protein bulking up tiny amounts of actual beef.
Sugar lurks in shocking amounts—up to 11g per serving in some brands! Add extreme sodium levels and mysterious “natural flavors,” and you’ve got a recipe for digestive disaster.
9. Mechanically Separated Chicken
Warning: nightmare fuel ahead! This isn’t even sold directly to consumers because it’s too horrifying. The production process literally pressure-blasts chicken carcasses to extract every last bit of “meat.”
The resulting pink slurry gets washed with ammonia before becoming the base for many processed meat products.
10. Canned Pork Brains
Yes, this really exists, and no, you should never eat it! One serving contains 3,500mg of cholesterol—that’s 1,170% of your recommended daily intake!
The gray matter comes packed in milk gravy that does nothing to improve the mushy texture. There’s absolutely no reason to put this in your shopping cart.
11. Canned Whole Chicken
Nightmare fuel in a giant can! An entire chicken—bones, skin and all—crammed into a tall metal container. When removed, it retains the cylindrical shape of its prison.
The pallid, gelatinous bird sits in a puddle of congealed fat and questionable liquid.
12. Scrapple In A Can
Pig parts you didn’t know existed, now in convenient can form! Traditional scrapple uses everything but the oink—hearts, livers, skins, and other leftover bits mixed with cornmeal.
The canned version somehow makes this worse by adding preservatives and stabilizers. Looks like gray cement, smells like wet dog food, tastes like regret.
13. Canned Bacon
Bacon deserves better than this! Packed in a sad spiral between sheets of paper, this flaccid pork product bears little resemblance to its crispy counterpart.
The texture can only be described as “damp leather,” and it contains chemical preservatives banned in many countries.
14. Armour Treet
Spam’s evil twin comes in a yellow can with equally frightening contents. This compressed meat rectangle contains mechanically separated chicken and pork mixed with corn syrup—because apparently meat needs sweetening?
One slice delivers 790mg of sodium, putting you well on your way to hypertension.
15. Canned Tamales
Real tamales are delicious. These canned imposters are crimes against Mexican cuisine! Wrapped in inedible paper instead of proper corn husks, they contain meat of questionable origin.
The mushy masa falls apart instantly, creating a sad gruel. The “chili gravy” they swim in contains more modified food starch than actual chilies.
16. Canned Sausage Gravy
Grayish-white sludge with meat-adjacent pellets floating throughout—appetizing, right? This southern breakfast staple gets butchered in can form.
The “sausage” bits contain more fillers than meat, while the gravy comes loaded with palm oil, modified food starch, and artificial flavors.