I have no idea how I came across this originally. Sometime while I was in the hospital last month. MRE’s, or “Military Ready to Eat, or Meal’s Ready to Eat” seem to be kinda passionate on Youtube. There’s one guy in particular I really enjoy and his ID is Steve1989. He has eaten all kinds of MRE’s dating back to WWII, and then recently he was sent Hard Tack from the Civil War, and he ate part of it!!! Enough that if it was bad he could have gotten sick.
But wait… this is not those stupid gross out videos of people eating rotten stuff. It is extremely informative, well done, calm. There’s none of the wild Youtube crap that infects so much of Youtube today. It’s fascinating to see how MRE’s were packaged over the years, stuff they used to add, like the British had MASSIVE doses of Amphetamines included for downed pilots and they weren’t supposed to take them without Officer instruction or they felt they had no more than couple hours left to live. You always hear about methamphetamine’s being given to German soldiers in WWII, but you don’t hear about wheat the U.S. and British did too. He samples MRe’s from old days and current day from countries all around the world. In fact, my parent shave a Roku and I just spent the evening with them and when their Satellite dish went out due to storm we watched 2 hours of his stuff! I wish I could suggest one to start you off with, but I’d just suggest you check out his channel and pick an episode that interests you. My favorites have been the WW2, Korean, and Vietnam Wars for the U.S., the SE Asian MRE’s, and current day Norwegian MRE’s. There are other Youtubers that do this as well, but I don’t care to see them really.
There is a term for watching someone do something that is calming and relaxing in a brainy way and I can’t remember the term. Like the Bob Ross painting guy from PBS.
I watched the hardtack episode, and I was horrified, not because of health or etc, but because he was so bold in destroying a museum-quality artifact from the Civil War by eating it. I wonder if his tourist visa to visit Egypt would be denied, because you know he would be eager to pilfer some ancient tomb snacks to make youtube clicks from it.
also
[quote=“jpinard, post:1, topic:120229, full:true”]my parent shave a Roku and I just spent the evening with them…
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this made me laugh :)
MRE’s are MRE’s; WW2 MREs’ are not MRE’s but C or K rations essentially, depending on where you served. Modern MRE’s weren’t invented until the late 70s and have gone through a number of iterations and evolutions since then. There were some growing pains; in the 80s you had to watch out for “bloaters”, which were MRE baggies (the individual meal portions) that started to go bad early. The bacteria would cause the baggies to bloat, which was a sure sign you shouldn’t eat it.
The system was generally decent by the time of Desert Storm and now it’s a pretty decent ration system that’s built to not just deliver food but an above-normal caloric intake. I’ve ingested various MREs over the years. Military scientists are continually trying to improve the flavor/taste/variety of food, including a pizza if I recall correctly.
Active duty deployed soliders would probably feel otherwise because of their consistent exposure to it, but I’ve always been impressed with MREs and what they deliver. (Also makes for great camping and/or survival food.)
I was totally obsessed with MREs as a 7-year-old or so kid. My Army brother got a bunch from a base being decommissioned or something, so we had a bunch in the closet. Our thrifty mother was perfectly amused to have free food that her kid was into eating.
I dunno, it was a meal-as-an-activity. Opening cans! Spreading things on crackers! Good times.
As an occasional thing, MREs are pretty entertaining with how much various stuff is inside of them. Entree, side dish, snack, dessert. Even matches, individual bottles of Tabasco and even John Wayne toilet paper (rough, tough, and don’t take shit off no one).
But when it’s the only thing you have to eat for two and a half months, fuck MREs. I lost 20 pounds in the last 3 months I was in the Gulf.
OK I am fascinated by thinking about this. So if someone were out in the field, like not with 50 trucks in tow, how are MRE’s carried or distributed? Like if 40 soldiers had to go scout out a small town and hold it down for backup to come and secure it and they had to do this on their own for several days. How do they carry it on their person? How many days worth can you carry comfortably? What about water too? Water seems like a real limiting agent, maybe even worse than ammunition?
It could be worse. The poor grunts during Desert Shield. There were only a handful of MRE menus back then, and the US needed to supply Arab allies with MREs. Only thing was, they’re Muslim, so they can’t eat pork. So the Arabs got all the non-pork MREs, and the Army was basically stuck with the infamous pork patty MRE. For months.
He covers this in the video description (he may have added it after your post, I dunno):
For those who are genuinely concerned that this Hardtack should have gone to a museum, well The Military Ration Museum (www.rationmuseum.com) already has multiple complete pieces of Hardtack with provenance. The president of the museum specifically instructed me to review and share this relic here in the manner that I did - he even told me to try & eat the whole thing if I could - and I did not because I am still sending the other half to the museum. With that being said - and for ALL of my Rations - I have duplicates of every single one of these that were reviewed and have already been donated to the museum. So please, there is absolutely no need for any inflammatory/hateful/misguided comments as to why I am “destroying history”. Remember, you didn’t go out and spend your $ on these items and donating them to a museum - and you probably never knew most of these items ever existed to begin with - so before you make a comment (that will be flagged and deleted) about how I am somehow doing some sort of disservice to the world or history by presenting these items - think about what you will say and please if you still feel the need to make your say, make it a good one. This IS the museum - the modern day virtual, not collecting dust in some place that can barely afford the electric bill, halfway across the country/world, and a place you will most likely never visit - it is a place that literally anyone on the planet can visit at any time. This channel is focused on the preservation and documentation of Military Rations - I have spent most of my life and most of my money in doing this - you are good at whatever it is you do in your life. And I am good at what i do in mine. Nor would I ever tell anyone else who most certainly knows far more about their general profession’s scope of practice how to do their own profession for I rightly know that they, 99% of the time, know what they’re doing and there is no need for me to pretend I know better. Thank you for watching, I hope you enjoy the material on this channel, respect eachother and the material.
Eating something that smells like mothballs is probably not a good idea, since it likely means that it was once actually stored with mothballs, which are naphthalene,and pretty toxic.
