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Comment by johan_larson | Hacker News Reader

I recently tried a bunch of knock-off MREs sold to civilians. As far as I could tell the contents of the kits were the same stuff as in real MREs, but packaged a bit differently.

My take is that the components that are naturally dry work best. Cookies, crackers, raisins, nuts: all of these are fine. Things get weird and unappealing once the components have to be wet, which is a problem because most of the main dishes are basically stews of various sorts.

I can appreciate that the MRE designers are facing a hard problem: making food that is shelf-stable for years yet palatable enough to be eaten for weeks on end. But the results really aren't very good.

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My recollection is that the MREs did weird things like included veggies as an ingredient in crackers to help add variety nutritionally, which did weird things to the taste.

I'm fine with eating dried fruits and roasted nuts. I don't see why there isn't more of that type thing in military field rations. Isn't that a tried and true means to preserve food for long periods while still being nutritious and delicious?

The British and other European ones do. Things like a pack of mixed nuts and raisins, or a pack of fruit rather than just in snack bars.

I've used MREs quite a few times, as they used to be much cheaper in surplus stores and handy for camping. There seems to be a fundamental difference in approach between Europe and the US.

The US seems to value longevity most (10 year shelf life rings a bell, I could be mistaken), and it's reflected in the taste, with sawdust flavoured crackers etc. European ration packs are much shorter shelf life (2 or 3 years, again not certain), but are much tastier as a result. The European ones have a lot more in the way of known brands with decent tea, coffee, chocolate etc.

The French are most adventurous with things like rabbit, duck, pate, venison etc. British had the best curry and puddings. Also seemed the most generous - something like 4,000 calories a day. Lots of snacks and sweets too, I guess to bump the calorie numbers.

The meals also need to be pretty calorie dense too though so that soldiers can carry them and quickly get the energy they need.

It's surprisingly difficult to produce combat rations that can provide enough calories for wartime activities. The (civilian) 2000 calorie diet on the side of the box now is already a joke for anybody reasonably active, but when you're humping a third to half your bodyweight through rough terrain, it's downright ridiculous. WW2 K-Rations (approx 3000 kcals daily), when not supplemented with anything better, frequently led to malnutrition, scurvy and other similar ailments, not to mention that troops on them for extended periods of time in a warzone lost so much weight and muscle mass that they were ineffective for months afterwards.

> I'm fine with eating dried fruits and roasted nuts. I don't see why there isn't more of that type thing in military field rations.

Probably because dried fruit and roasted nuts are both pretty expensive compared to normal rations.

Also I’m pretty sure my digestive system would be pretty unhappy if I were eating primarily nuts and dried fruit for days or weeks on end.

"I don't see why there isn't more of that type thing in military field rations." does not mean "Let's feed troops exclusively dried fruit and nuts and nothing else."

Re expense: They spend millions on research to develop new MREs. If "Healthy, palatable food that already exists costs too much" is a primary basis for rejecting it, something is wrong with this picture.

Dried fruit and nuts ARE a significant part of many different Country's soldier meals. The problem is that it just doesn't do for a soldier's morale what something like pizza or chili does. A soldier doesn't want health food, he wants comfort food

I paid attention to the part of the article that mentioned that the pizza slice comes packaged with a protein shake. That sounds just like veggie crackers to me.

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