Pork-like product?

A weekend trip to New Jersey with my man pal, a variety of mixed CD grooviness and a sack of retro snacks (oh yeah, and P.S. Crackerjacks…your “prizes” have weakened considerably…a paper pencil topper is NOT a sweet prize…bring back the hologram stickers!) proved to be quite a learning experience for me. While I had once considered myself well-versed in the world of food and drink, I was proven quite wrong. I learned that there is a whole culture out there of people who eat deep fried pockets of greasy, pulverized meats, called empanadas. I learned that I can find my happy place drinking $1.50 drafts at 1:45 in the afternoon at The Basset Pub, a dive bar full of smelly men singing Spanish polka tunes. I threw back beers with the boys at Hooters. And oh yes, I had my first White Castle experience. I feel like a changed person.

Ok, so really I just drank a lot of beer and ate a lot of bad food all weekend. I know. I am eating a salad right now to make up for it.

But the most surprising of them all was this encased ham-ish, sodium-induced product, that was sliced like a flower and cooked on a griddle. Taylor Ham. Never heard of it. (But of course I had to Photoshop the meat to enhance the graphic detail of the pork-like product).
A quick Google search revealed that it is also called 'Pac Man meat.' Well, while I am a huge fan of the 80’s, I’m still not sold. You could call it Cabbage Patch Kid Meat or Debbie Gibson Meat and I still wouldn’t bite.

It was a great weekend, though. Traffic, running out of gas, sleeping on a wrestling mat, heartburn and all.