Chuseok is considered to be the Korean Thanksgiving.  It happens on a different date each year but is during the fall time and celebrates the fall harvest.  People get time off work and spend time with their extended families and often visit their ancestral graves.

It is also a time to give gifts to your family members, your bosses, and friends.  One of the most popular gifts to give is a case of high-end spam.

the gift of spam

Spam was brought to Korea by American soldiers during the Korean War.  The country was impoverished and war-torn and food was hard to find.  Finding a source of protein like meat was even harder.

Now it is used frequently in stews, fried rice dishes, and comes in a variety of flavors.  The picture above is the “premium gift set” and costs about $45.  That must be some good spam.

There are plenty of other gift sets with items like shampoo, lotion, dried fruit, and dried whole fish.

dried persimmons from $100 to $200

dried fish used for cooking

packages of whole fish, the one in the middle is a whopping $350

So the next time you are thinking about buying a gift and you find yourself stumped, just go for some spam.