So I've never eaten a MRE before

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Gunbuffer

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I've been on a kick lately on the Youtube rabbit hole and apparently there's guys who make videos of eating old MREs. I watched one the other day of a guy fixing up some breakfast from I think the 70s...
I'm not that brave.
@Steve1989mreinfo
His voice puts me to sleep
And my favorite was the early 90’s meatballs in bbq sauce. Hated the chicken ala king
 

ssgrock3

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I was in long ago enough to have eaten the first generation of MRE. You learned real quick to be selective. A few things were pretty good. A few things weren't bad. The rest was kind of rough to terrible. Fast forward to the late 90's and I get deployed to Kuwait. By this time was on the second or third generation MRE's. Very notable improvement. There was only a few things I just couldn't get cozy with. You've made me curious about how they would be now.

Same here, they filled your gut, and with hot sauce they could be palatable at least. Hell the new ones are high Eatin’ now lol


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RickN

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I was out at the gun club one night picking up brass and the National Guard or someone was out there that weekend. When I checked the dumpster for wildlife there were cases of cut open MREs thrown in there. Something tells me they had someone do a pizza run or something and trashed what they were suppose to eat.
 

dennishoddy

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Some years back in my career, I was the director of strategic new product development for a large meat company. I had a guy bring a shelf stable prime rib in for me to try. It was absolutely horrible. That said, we will have at some point, shelf stable meats that are as good as fresh cut. The technology is coming.

We had shelf stable meats back in the 70's. Called freeze dried steaks. About 1/8" thick and hard as a rock. Two hours in a water bath to make them about 3/8" thick and not much more tender when cooked. That was officer food. We may or may not have "procured" some of their food at one given time, or two. I'm sure the statute of limitations has passed though?
 

kroberts2131

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The jalapeño cheese is the best. Also loved the spaghetti ones when I was in the sandbox. Came with blueberry cobbler.

You might try mixing the hot sauce in the water with your heater next time. Take a deeeeep breath of it too. I hear it’s a good time!
 

HFS

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The very early MREs didn't have hot sauce.
The crackers were what I imagine slate tiles from a roof would be like.
And the peanut butter or cheese spread was hard as a *$^&#^$#&$% rock. Plastic utensils wouldn't touch it, they would break.
The chicken a la king, as old folks would say, "looked like it had been et before." Just gross.
I am glad the later versions aren't as bad.
 

BillPenn

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MRE's in the 80's and 90's were mostly Ok. Did break a tooth on a dehydrated beef patty once. The biggest issue was you only had 12 selections to choose from. Try eating that 3 times a day for months on end. After a while no amount of hot sauce or creativity would help choke one down.
 

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