MRE Menu 16: Chicken Burrito Bowl

[xTRiiSHx]

Hey everyone, new member here.
I was just wondering if anyone would be interested in my MRE taste tests and reviews? Let me know, it’s a weekend hobby!

[Straight Shooter]

Its always welcome ....reviews... for this type of food , but what are your plans when you run out ?.....good for short term but not sustainable long term.

[Mortblanc]

No, no SS!

MRE meals are what you eat after your preps have run out!

That or after they fall out of the UN relief plane and hit you on the head.

[CharlesHarris]

I find it interesting that he is evaluating genuine US-issue MREs and not the civilian knock-offs. I wonder if he is serving in the forces and trading his steak and kidney pie with the Yanks or is coming by stolen government property in some other way?

[Midnitemo]

Meals Rejected by Ethiopian's........can't get it out of my head....some are quite nice though.

[CharlesHarris]

Meals Rejected by Everyone is another moniker, but overall better than the "C" rations MB and I ate in our mis-spent youth. When I went through Basic School in the early 1970s we ate "C"s which were probably leftovers from Korea. "Ham & Mothers" (ham with lima beans) was a favorite, as were "Green Eggs & Ham", "Oh my, much better than SPAM, a lean green fighting machine I am, I am, how I love my Green Eggs and Ham!"

[Mortblanc]

It was the weight of those C-rats that kept us lean and mean.

The standard C-rat had 1200 calories but weighed a ton and the bulk was massive. On patrols we would strip the rats down to one per day rather than three per day just because we could not carry all that weight plus all our ammo and squad gear.

The use of cans made it necessary to stop movement and prep food then eat. You could not always do that and many times we went hungry while carrying food on our backs. You don't just say "I'm hungry lets have lunch", well not in the U.S forces anyway. Eating on patrol is optional and you are going to be on long and short patrols constantly. A company outpost would have a day patrol and a night patrol and only three under strength platoons so you were always on patrol, just back from patrol, or getting ready for patrol.

The modern MRE is made with that process in mind and they include more carb dense snacks and sides that can be eaten on the move with no heating needed and no long stops for meal prep.

On a patrol or in a "bug out" situation, you can have the best food around and not be able to eat it due to not being able to stop and heat or cook a meal.

It is the easy to eat sides and snacks that make a good ration and not so much the main courses, at least for the combat troops.

[Pete Grey]

(17 September 2018, 15:53)Mortblanc Wrote: .........On a patrol or in a "bug out" situation, you can have the best food around and not be able to eat it due to not being able to stop and heat or cook a meal.

It is the easy to eat sides and snacks that make a good ration and not so much the main courses........

I think we should all bare this in mind when packing a BOB or GHB or just for a long hiking trip.

[CharlesHarris]

Even today the troops tend to "field strip" the MREs to remove excess packaging and to move the snacks, drink powder and Pogie Bait items to BDU pockets and store the entree in the ruck to eat later.

[Mortblanc]

I had two young Marines in Iraq at the height of the hostilities there.

One of the things I was under strict instruction to send in each "care package" was a couple of pounds of my home made beef jerky for consumption on patrols.

And stripping the MRE down as CH has stated was standard practice.

Their patrols were normally 6 hours long and there were no breaks for meals. 6 hours in life threatening conditions followed by 6 hours of rest followed by 6 hours of life threatening conditions. 12 hours a day of danger and 12 hours a day of slightly less danger, and they did that for 8 months solid for two or three deployments and living on MRE meals for the whole time. (#2 son did get a trip to Burger King in Bagdad on one day off.)

We are talking about young men in a very active situation that are burning 4k-5k calories daily. They need calories while on the go and in convenient form to allow eating while 100% tactically alert. The standard of approval was things like the soft cheese and peanut butter that was packaged in tubes that they could simply squeeze into their mouths, or jerky, or biscuits they could eat with one hand while holding their rifle in the other.

Some day people will realize that combat is the ultimate survival scenerio. Not "war", where most soldiers are tied up in the supply chain, but the actual experiences of the 10% of the troops that are patrolling daily in the operational areas.

It is one thing to worry and complain because you MRE heater has not brought your water to the temperature you prefer, and another thing to take the heater out and throw it in the rubbish because you now you will not be using it.

The MRE heater was used, but the process was to add a slight amount of water and stick the heater into your clothing, over your chest, to stay warm on cold desert nights.