Winning Cook Takes Spam in Hand and Makes It Disappear

There are those who would say a best Spam recipe is an oxymoron, like military justice.

Not Sherman Oaks attorney Richard Mikesell.

Mikesell won the Best Spam Recipe Contest on Monday at the Los Angeles County Fair.

No, he isn’t afraid of the pink meat, even if it is the subject of more jokes than Monica Lewinsky. And, yes, he usually has a can of Spam in his pantry, even when he isn’t trying to fashion a prize-winning recipe from it.

There are a lot of closet Spam enthusiasts out there, suspects Mikesell, whose first taste of Spam was as a toddler during World War II, when meat that didn’t come in cans was rationed.

“Someone is consuming millions of cans a year of Spam,” he points out. “It’s canned ham, for heaven’s sake. It lasts a long time, and it’s convenient, and it’s got one big advantage over tuna fish. It was dolphin-safe before dolphin-safe was cool.”

You can argue with Mikesell over how desirable lasting a long time is in a foodstuff that isn’t destined for your survival kit. But Mikesell’s recipe does sound intriguing, even if it is made with Spam.

He calls the dish that triumphed over 59 other entries (including a deviled ham souffle, which came in second, and third-place Spicy Spam Thai Salad) Spamigo.

*

In essence, Spamigo is a green chile stew inspired by similar dishes he enjoyed in northern New Mexico.

You start by roasting a dozen fresh, mild Anaheim chiles, he explains. Seed them and dice them. Then halve 10 tomatillos. Cube up your can of Spam. Then cook all three ingredients for a couple of hours in a vegetable broth flavored with chopped onion, bell pepper, celery salt, cumin and garlic.

Next, put all of the above into the blender and whir away.

“That’s important because it makes the little pink chunks of Spam disappear,” he explains.

Making the little pink chunks disappear can only be a good thing, you have to agree. Then, Mikesell adds cubed cooked potato, some Niblets corn and a diced jalapeno pepper.

To serve, he directs, “Garnish with cilantro and radish.”

Spamigo won Mikesell $100, as well as a Spam T-shirt and apron. But best of all, it made him one of 77 finalists nationwide in the Best Spam Recipe Contest, sponsored by the product’s maker, Hormel.

The Big Spam-Off isn’t like the Pillsbury Bake-Off, a high-anxiety event in which finalists gather to re-create their recipes on stoves provided by the sponsor.

In this contest, Mikesell says, “nobody goes anywhere.” Hormel does what it needs to do in the privacy of its headquarters, relying on a written version of each local winner’s recipe.

“I don’t even know what their judging standards are,” he confesses.

The grand prize is a $2,500 shopping spree at the world’s largest mall--the Mall of America in Bloomington, Minn., the one that has its own amusement park. The winner is to be announced before Jan. 15, 1999.

The 57-year-old Mikesell, whose day job is civil litigation, decided to enter the contest on a friend’s dare.

“Because I cook, I decided to enter a cooking contest, and I thought the Spam one would be the most fun,” he recalls.

Mikesell began cooking before he met his wife, Candy, a retired medical technician.

Mikesell cooks frequently for friends, “mostly spectacular presentations,” including roast goose and beef Wellington. He says he also makes a mean curry.

“I’m married to a Renaissance man,” Candy says. He has filled their house with stained-glass creations. He’s a photographer. He recently took a knife-making course. He writes, and loves to travel.

Candy says she didn’t mind eating the three or four attempts Mikesell made before he got Spamigo just right.

Mikesell didn’t expect all the attention, including reporters’ phone calls, he has received as a result of marrying his fortune to that of a little can of pink meat.

“I am kind of surprised that my 15 minutes of fame is coming in this arena,” he says. “I thought it would be in a courtroom somewhere.”

Anybody can win a case.

Only somebody with a real gift could eliminate the little pink chunks.