In a vain attempt to be more like the Recon Marines in “Generation Kill” (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0995832/), we bought a package of 12 MREs (Meals, Ready to Eat) off eBay for 73€ incl. shipping (6€ per MRE). These are the supply ratios of the US Military, prominently featured, mocked and debated in Generation Kill.
Recently I watched some guy at thedailywtf.com (http://thedailywtf.com/Articles/Souvenir-Potpourri-Meal-Ready-to-Eat.aspx) eating a MRE someone sent him. He didn’t like it. But then I don’t like his site, so who cares? Point being, my expectations were pretty low.
But behold! The MREs I’ve eaten until now tasted pretty good. Yea, it’s not 5-star-cuisine, but it’s better than many things I’ve cooked. Menus I had so far were Pork Rib, Beef and Gravy and Meat Balls.
In case you’ve never eaten a MRE yourself, let me break down what each package contains. The stated goal of the MRE is printed on the meal packaging. It is to ensure the proper nutrition and energy level of a soldier in training or combat. In these very demanding situations, the carton states, a male soldier needs between 2800 and 3600 calories per day (2000 - 2800 for women). Each MRE contains between 1200 and 1300 calories. The soldier is advised that he needs three full meals a day! Three MREs would contain between 3600 and 3900 calories, too much, but this isn’t much of a problem, as you’ll see shortly.
There are also some tips on how to eat if you don’t have much time. Eat some of each component to ensure variety of nutrients, eat calorie dense carbohydrate components first (crackers, bread-type-things, sweets, drinking powder). Yes, they actually tell you to eat drinking powder. People seem to do this, as it is shown in Generation Kill. I guess it’s more convenient than fixing yourself a glass of water and stirring the powder in while you’re being shot at or driving around in your humvee.
The MRE consists of the following components:
- Main course (1 or 2 bags, e.g. pork rib in one bag and clam chowder in one bag, or beef in one and mashed potatoes in the other)
These are usually based around some kind of meat. There are also three vegetarian MREs in our carton, featuring cheese omelet, bean stew and the like. The meal is marinated with sauce in the bag. The ones I had were quite good. Maybe a little low on flavour, but there’s extra salt and spice in each bag (see below). There is also a little bag with extra sauce, like barbeque sauce for the pork rib.
- Cooking bag with chemical heater
You place the main course (and/or coffee drinking bag, see below) into this. Then pour a little water in. The chemical heater triggers, you place everything into a carton and it cooks. Takes about 10 to 15 minutes. To avoid uneven heating, you can knead the meal during or after cooking. Cooking this way is extremely fun and takes no equipment.
- Drinking powder, to be stirred in water (or eaten from bag if you like)
These are very sugary. I stirred mine in a half-liter glass of water, and there was still a 1cm sugar crust at the bottom. The ones we had so fare were cocoa (very good), punch (so so), lemonade (good) and iced tea (good). The packaging of my punch states it contains soy. They probably fortified this to make it more of a protein shake. Most of the foods are heavily fortified with vitamins or other nutrients.
- Bread/Tortilla/Crackers with spread
As an entry dish while your main course is cooking. These are pretty good. The bread tastes a little boring, but hey, it will last for two years. Of course it’s not as fresh as real bread. One thing that amazed me was the fat content of these breads. I don’t know of any other kind of bread that gets 50% of its calories from fat! This is actually pretty clever to prevent insulin spiking and ensure long term fullness.
I had tortillas with jalapeno cheese spread, crackers with cheese spread, bread with cheese spread and crackers with peanut butter and jelly. The “normal” cheese spread doesn’t have much taste, it’s almost disgusting. But the jalapeno cheese and the peanut butter and jelly were very good. I’m not sure if the mix of the bread/spread is random. In Generation Kill, Colbert complains of a stupid combination of bread and spread. Something like jelly on a tortilla. Maybe I was just lucky until now?
The bread and spread contain enormous amounts of fat. I think this is important. I was worried about all the carbohydrates in the MREs (and there are lots), but they made sure to also include protein and fat. I’m guessing you wouldn’t need all the fancy meal technology to just carry around dried bread and crackers.
- Two snacks
These are interesting, mainly because I don’t know many of them. Americans seem to eat different snacks than germans. For example I’d never eaten M&Ms with peanut butter before. Also “the cookie” seems to be popular in the MREs. I mean one large cookie. We also had coffee beans covered in chocolate, a “pop tart” (some kind of cake), a fig bar, beef jerky, cheesy chips and others.
On the packaging, the soldier is advised to safe snacks if there is no time to eat. He can then eat the snacks on the go when hungry. Since the snacks are all high-calorie, this allows for moderation of the caloric intake. A very hungry soldier can eat all the snacks and some he saved earlier, a not-so-hungry soldier just saves for later. In Generation Kill the soldiers save their snacks in a huge carton in their humvee to eat while driving.
- Utility bag
These always contain matches, a moist towel and a dry towel. Also coffee or iced tea, salt or spices, sometimes “butter buds” (no idea what that is, presumably some kind of butter-powder) or cream powder for the coffee. I tried one of the coffees and it was pretty good. Then again I hate coffee. If I liked it, that may be a sign of its non-coffeeness. Also: there are always two cinnamon chewing gums. My roommate hates those, but I like them. You can’t chew them very long though. I guess they’re just to help with dental hygiene or something.
- The spoon
Of course. You need something to eat from the bags. The spoon is pretty bad for something like pork rib, which I ate from the bag like a candy bar.
Ingredients
This is pretty amazing. I’ve never seen so many ingredients in food. One carton had 21 lines of ingredients printed on it! Among them things I’ve never heard of (FD&C in different colors). The famous high fructose corn sirup is omnipresent. I’m not sure we have this in germany, it might just have another name. Also lots of “regular” sugar, dextrose, fructose, glucose and so on. There’s lots of wheat and soy, sometimes milk. If you’ve got allergies, you’re fucked.
Considering this has to last for years in arctic and hot climate, survive drops from planes, be ready in 10 minutes to eat on the run, provide ALL the necessary nutrients for the soldiers (no eating apples in foreign desert countries), give comfort in firefights and be cheap, it’s no wonder that it’s more chemical than food. It’s the most high-tech food I’ve ever eaten. Maybe NASA has more technology in their food.
Still I think they did a great job. Most of the meals taste pretty good, though some could use more seasoning. I have to tinker with the spice/sauce packages a little. The snacks are interesting and tasty. Not very healthy though, I guess.
Overall I’m not sure how healthy the MRE as a whole is. They’re based on the RDA. I don’t know how good these are. Nutrition isn’t a real science yet, more like witchcraft and make-belief. But they wouldn’t hurt their own troops, right?
The thing that amazes me most about the MREs is the way they fill you up. Unlike typical meals that would contain the same 1200-1300 calories, they don’t stuff you up to the point of puking. Instead you get quite full, and stay full, for a very long time. Somehow the food seems to stay in you a lot longer than normal food. It also keeps me very awake and makes me feel warm.
To show you what I’m talking about (and to try out OmniGraphSketcher, which is cool but which I seem to have no use for - until now!), I’ve made a picture:
Overall I like the MREs. They’re very fun to eat and you don’t have to clean up. Just throw everything in the trash. I wouldn’t want to eat them every day for a long time, but they’re not too bad. Definitely a fun experience. Much tastier than I anticipated. Also, 6€ per meal is not much considering all the snacks and included beverage powders.
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