I have a smallish pantry for someone who cooks as much as I do, and I have to stack canned goods two and three high to make the best use of the space. I was neatly stacking up my tuna cans and it occurred to me to wonder, since the technology to make stackable cans is clearly not beyond our collective abilities, why the hell ALL canned food isn’t packaged in stackable cans. All it takes is a little lip on the bottom of the can, people! Get with the fewking program.
I know they say that whenever the question starts with “Why don’t they…?” the answer is always “Money.” But stop being such a cheap-ass nickel-sucker, Mr. Can Maker. If there were one brand of (say) black-eyed peas that used stackable cans and fifteen brands that did not, people would gravitate to the stackable ones even if it cost a few pennies more. I know I would.
In the meantime, I am left with no recourse but to entertain my cats by saying "Goddam cheap-ass nickel-sucking, hollow-chested, syphilitic can-making monkey-fuckers!" every time I try to retrieve a can of chicken broth from the pantry and send ten cans of green chiles rolling all over the kitchen because you shit-festered uncle-fucking can manufacturers are too damn cheap to retool your operations!
pant, pant
Thank you for your time.
holds up score card
I’ll give it a 10, because I agree with everything you said, AND it made me laugh.
Depends what’s in the can, me brutha. Tuna’s something you usually want control over, something you partly-flick out with a fork for Mr. Whiskers and save some for later. Same goes for just about anything in a small can that doesn’t “settle”.
Your can of Cream o’ Mushroom, though, tends to get used all at once. It’s better to make cans on which can openers work on both ends so you can unseal both ends and clean the sucker out in one fell swoop.
Like, duh.
Max, I don’t presume to speak for you… obviously the desire to extract a freakish, quivering, gelatinous striated cylinder of mushroom soup concentrate is more important to you than an orderly pantry. My priorities are different. But there’s no reason why we can’t agree to disagree.
wait a minute, this is the Pit.
I’m right and you’re weird. grin
Well, I feel sorry for you. I have a really BIG pantry. Oh, now stop drooling! (Never thought I’d have a man lusting after me over my STORAGE space!)
But even with this big space it IS annoying how a lot of cans don’t stack well. It makes balancing everything a major pain in the ass. I too, am a lot more inclined to take a different product if it DOES have that little tuck that makes it easily stack-able. Usually, we’re talking pennies in difference of cost.
I guess it comes back to the beast of supply and demand. Most folks don’t know what they are going to have for lunch today let alone what they will have tomorrow. But I feel for ya, hon. And, you aren’t lying about this pain, are you? No, no, you’ve got more than 100 posts so I GUESS that you are okay…
YEAH! And maybe a little more in the top collar for the can opener to grip!
I don’t want to sound like a grumpy old man, since I’m a grumpy middle-aged man, but didn’t can openers last longer at one time? Like years, not days? I mean the relatively good ones, too. There seems to be no relationship between durability and price.
I’m still reeling from the shock that Chef has so many damn cans in the first place.
What, catching and killing your own tuna too hard fer ya?
Get rid of those crappy cans (ok, hold on to a few if we go into WWIII or somethin’) and make some real food, babe.
dropzone – I’ve had the same can opener for over 15 years. It’s one of those big ones with the plastic dipped handles. You might try one of those. I think they are around 10 now. And don’t bother with an electric can opener. They are just a major pain in the ass unless you are opening a LOT of cans.
If you’re like me and I know I am, I generally use “fresh” ingredients but there are times when this isn’t possible and it’s always nice to have some “back ups” in the pantry. That’s why I have so many canned items.