Worst MREs - Meals Rejected by Everyone
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 13 มิ.ย. 2024
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Come take a seat at our banquet of historical bad rations! We have constipation biscuits for those who are not too hungry, omelet Play-Doh for breakfast. Don't worry, we have plenty of Civil War-era coffee too, it's even edible! For our regulars, we have our menu changed each century. Our lunch mains today being beef with maggot spaghetti, stew that will rumble in your tummy happily for weeks, and cooked beef that'll even make your dog drool. We have plenty of nutrient-dense drinks. Pick your choice from either horse blood OR fermented horse milk!
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Credit:
Show Created by Daniel Turner (B.A. (Hons) in History, University College London)
Script: Jake Leigh-Howarth
Narrator:
Chris Kane
vocalforge.com/
Amelinckx, Andrew. "Old Time Farm Crime: The Embalmed Beef Scandal of 1898." Modern Farmer, Nov 08, 2013.
Arrsepedia. "Biscuits Brown." Last modified 15 May 2009.
BBC. "Russian army 'dog food whisteblower' Matveyev jailed." 9 September 2011.
Blum, Deborah. “Gloom and Horror Unrelieved." PBS, January 27, 2020.
Brocklehurst, Steven. "World War One: The dubious reputation of Maconochie's stew." BBC, 23 April 2014.
Burrows, Alda. "What’s In A Russian MRE?" CitySignal, last modified April 7, 2022.
Bushcraft USA. "British Army Rations - Laxatives?" May 21, 2010.
Cartwright, Mark. "Food & Drink in the Mongol Empire." WorldHistory, 26 September 2019.
Disgusting Food Museum. "Kumis." Facebook, July 3, 2019.
Grinspan, Jon. "How Coffee Fueled the Civil War." The New York Times, July 9, 2014.
Grove, Thomas. "Whistleblower says Russian troops fed dog food." Reuters, May 19, 2011.
Keuchel, E.F. 1974. ‘Chemicals and Meat: The Embalmed Beef Scandal of the Spanish American War’. Bulletin of the History of Medicine 48, no. 2. (Summer) 249-264.
Lamb, Robert. "Ridiculous History: The Civil War's Worst Cup of Coffee." HowStuffWorks, 15 October 2016.
Lunn, Zachary. "The Legend of the Vomelet." Slate, May 06, 2019.
MilitaryHistoryNow. "Billy Yank, Johnny Reb and a Cup of Joe - Real Coffee Was a Rarity for Civil War Soldiers." 10 May, 2012.
Polo, Marco. "The Travels of Marco Polo/Book 1/Chapter 54." Translated by Henry Yule. Wikisource, accessed 20 March, 2023.
Rum Ration. "The end of Biscuits Brown." Feb 12, 2009.
Scientific American. "The Link Between Climate and Mongolia's Thirst for Fermented Horse Milk." January 20, 2023.
The Observers. "Whistleblower officer says Russian troops served dog food." Last modified May 30, 2011.
Thank you to Morgan & Morgan for sponsoring today’s video. Visit this link if you’d like a free consultation: www.forthepeople.com/SimpleHistory
Face reveal 🎉🎉🎉
2:27 to skip.
I never thought I would see the day when simple history would reveal his face
I've got a vomlette in storage ready for a review...cant wait😬
2:33 2:45 🤮🤢
My grandfather was on the team devising the preservation methods for the entrees in first gen MREs. I told him about the vomelet and he was genuinely incensed. "We left extensive notes on why eggs can't be thermostabilized, and those idiots tried again?"
So even the scientists didn't approve
@@Babihrse Not in the least. Freeze drying them for the Meal, Cold Weather was fine, but thermostabilizing eggs just doesn't work.
@ Re your grandfather, It seems every generation has to learn some things for themselves - following the advice of their forebears just isn't a thing.
Sounds like the folks who came after your grandfather thought 'We've come so far and improved so much since those days! Surely what was not possible then is possible now?'
@@richardarcher7177 Unfortunately so.
I actually knew a guy who liked the vomelet- but I also witnessed him eating things no human would consider palatable, and am pretty sure he just enjoyed being able to eat everyone else’s ration. Guy was always hungry, and nothing ever upset his stomach, not entirely sure he was human
Yeah, he has to be a Ghoul.
Skin walkers on the army wtf
Or he has an extremely strong stomach
Modern day Terrare
@@dbabakh8911 nah, allergic to crickets and bananas. Mildly, but still
The omelette MRE made me realize that the people who made the MREs never actually gave them a taste test before subjecting the troops to their horror.
I won't be surprised, if they _knew_ that it would taste awful, but hoped that it will pass
I would probably just shoot myself. I cant even stomach what people call amazing omelets nvm the worst ones known to man.
It might be a case of the flavor changing over time.
@@GeorgeMonet I refuse to believe it has ever been good.
Was it possible by accident to break the Tabasco because I saw ether as a packet or mini bottle like super small
The fact that Teddy Roosevelt tasted the embalmed beef shows how dedicated he was.
He was a trooper.
@@ElBandito He was. I can't think of anyone else who was shot while making a speech and still finished the speech.
The notes and glasses case in his pocket slowed the bullet down enough that it didn't go very far into his chest.
"Death had to take Roosevelt sleeping, for if he had been awake, there would have been a fight."
@@hamishjones960 If there's ever a movie about Roosevelt, the ending needs to be 1. Roosevelt dying. 2. That quote. 3. A post-credits scene showing Teddy bare-knuckle boxing the grim reaper.
Dude was a badass
By contrast, the dehydrated strawberries in the MREs we had in the late 80's were awesome.
The freeze dried peaches, too.
Mix them with the cream and sugar and they made a decent field expedient strawberries and cream.😉
@@korbell1089 Oh, damn straight, you could get all kinds of creative with those and the peaches 👍
Freeze dried fruit cocktail. 😋
the freeze-dried peaches and fruit cocktail were great.
If you ignore the main course, Cheese and Veggie Omelete had some great sides. However, one time a friend and I tried to see who could eat a whole mre cracker without any water, and I think we both lost that challenge...
sounds about right
Interesting
Soggy hashbrowns and wheat snack bread are not what I would call "great sides."
@@StudleyDuderight it gets the job done
I rather enjoyed that MRE in my service. I've had every single menu # in existence over the past 22 years and I've ONLY disliked 1 MRE the entire time s and that was the old beef Frank's from back in the 90's.
Now the trick to this particular MRE (as with many) is to mush up all the sides into 1 big pile of chow and dump out the Tabasco sauce and salt & pepper into it and mud it all up.
Unfortunately the Tabasco sauce no longer comes in those lil glass bottles and only a few menus in a entire series has it. Tabasco sauce and coffee used to come in every MRE back in the day. However the MRE's we get today are waaay better. They come with First Strike PowerBars, better electrolyte drink mixes, spiced apples instead of regular applesauce and they finally got chocolate poundcakes!!
The only complaint I have about today's MRE's is that not all have the Tabasco sauce or coffee. Oh cigarettes too! I don't smoke but there's just something cool and cliché about a soldier or marine going out on patrol with a pack of Luckies strapped to their. They SHOULD add those little 5 cigarette packs of Camels to the rations again
Mongolian here! Just to let you all know, not only is айраг (airag) the only item on this list that wasn't a digestive disaster waiting to happen, it's also more than likely the only item on this list that people genuinely enjoy! To us, it's not much different as any other alcoholic beverage is to other groups of people.
I've drank some, a buddy of mine got some from his vacations, don't know if it was "the good stuff" but...interesting stuff at least.
While it was weird at first, I can understand how you guys like it.
I do wonder why it was included on this list if it was actually healthy and enjoyed by the soldiers. This is a list for terrible MREs and soldiers food.
@@ameritoast5174
Probably to do with the "soldiers sucked horse blood" part. I agree with you wholeheartedly, though.
@@ameritoast5174maybe to show the most unlikely ration was actually really good
Beef Ravioli was quite the treat from an MRE in the Marine Corps, likewise with the blueberry crayon for dessert.
Henry Boyardee made sure you marines had some good comfort food through ration testing. God rest his soul
Wait so the marines eat crayons thing is real? i dont live in the US so i always thought it was a joke
@Velociraptor d'Annunzio as an American I can confirm that is in our MRE's
@@That_Mazzini_Fan no, they don't eat them. Maybe some do, as a joke. But the trope is that Marines are mentally challenged, and thus they eat crayons.
I THINK crayons were included in care packages or something and that's what started the joke.
Chef boyardee, the master!
My sister is in the Army. My dad and I joke that the reason she ranked up so fast is because she can eat MREs without complaining. The girl has no taste buds. Every time she cooks, she gives me and dad nightmares. I swear, she once drank a full bowl of hot sauce.
Regardless, proud parent and brother.
Your sister is cut for that life haha, a natural unit.
Lol :D That's equally awesome and depressing.
She sounds like one heck of a girl
She probably just slept with everyone
We have a name for this kind of soldier. Tin Guts. My respects to your sister. I retired a Major, but she is one woman I would gladly call 'Sir'.
Can confirm I was forced to eat the vomlette in Basic Training back in 2007. Since we were in BCT, the condiments pack, pop tarts, and heater had to be turned over to the drill sergeant before consumption. Starving and needing the calories I was able to eat half of the vomellete, cold, wet and without hot sauce. I threw it up in barracks later that night no joke.
Why would the army continue to serve it. It makes the troops sick they end up hungrier than they were before they ate it. Look they'll just have to learn to love it. We have a 10 year contract with tasty bagged mystery food Inc and nobody is going to admit they made a mistake on the purchase.
Also went through basic in 07 Benning. Where were you?
@@Cam_88 Fort Leonard Wood
Never did that. Use to "aquire " 1's left behind by the ranges or break areas.Crackers,jams,peanut butter & freeze-dried fruit was my favorite. Same with the freeze-dried pork.Always traded with those who did not like or eat pork MRE.Out of courtesy & favorite. Traded them or passed to battle buddy.My favors a chocolate chip cake.Kept the extras in my rucksack.Esp. the crackers? & fruit??Use to bring cans of chili to pour over rice rations in the field B rations.When on active duty & weekend warrior drills I gave or mailed to a old friend.Also MRE'S: MEALS REJECTED BY SOMALIS?
@@e.a.corral4713 in all my years of military service, no one I know EVER called it "freeze-dried pork." Where are you from?
My father was in the United States Army back in the late 80’s, and he said the MRE that everyone hated was Chicken A La King, he claimed it looked like vomit and tasted even worse
Your father is 100% correct.
It's rumoured to have been even worse than the Vomlet from what i've heard?
It was inedible and unsalvageable. 🤢
chicken a la king itself looks like vomit and tastes worse.....
I would eat the h ell out of chicken ala king.
Semper.
My first MRE was in 1989. My last was in 2004. The quality of the MRE has improved vastly in that time. For all the criticism I myself gave them, I have to applaud them for doing a lot to make them better.
Beef and mushrooms and pork chow main where alway last ones in the cast in 2003 OIF
And after an all day hike with full gear it's amazing how great they can taste when hungry. I just wish we had the self heating MRE's back in the day.
Still not good compared to other countries MREs
@@MrMojo23100My first MRE was in 2006 and my last one was 2022.
So I’m guessing you were born between 68-71
Man that "Premium Quality Beef" story just really shows how far some people will go to cut costs, long-term consequences be damned. Even silencing someone doing the right thing.
How very Russian of them.
Damn we overlook of Russian Officials silencing the whistleblower was supposed to be the red flag of the Russian government that something emminent is going to happen in the future
I doubt it was actually cost cutting, more likely some general skimming money
The USA has problems, but never think for one minute that Russia is a better alternative. Russia is a warning of what the USA could become if it fails to stop corruption and address its internal issues.
Yeah the western owned Russian army of the 90s was a nightmare. This is basically how the ukranion one is still run now, meanwhile the Russkies have moved on to have some of the best around.
My grandfather who was in Vietnam and continued to serve until 1999 with the US Army taught me Meals Rejected by Ethiopians, implying that a starving person would reject MREs
Edit: Didn’t expect top comment for that. Glad y’all enjoyed my contribution, well most of y’all anyways
Sounds rather offensive?
Though I can understand what he meant.
@@koharumi1 Many Ethiopians have unfortunately starved, how is that racist?
@@koharumi1 everything is racist atp
@@koharumi1 yo momma racist
Ethiopia is a country comprised of many ethnic minorities. Ethiopian is a nationality and not a race.
I went to Basic in 2006. It was there that I was first introduced to the vomlete. That thing always managed to cure my hunger by robbing me of my appetite, and I wasn't the only one. My entire Platoon cherry picked around them, and ate everything else.
Our Drills got us good though. One day, while out in the field, they brought us several MRE boxes full of the vomletes we had avoided. We had no options. It was horrible.
Nightmare fuel.
There were a couple of items in our C-Rations that most soldiers had trouble with. The ham & eggs, chocolate "puck" were quickly traded. I was on active duty 1974-81 and on my first hitch you could still get cigarettes in the box with your meal. The cigarettes came 5 to a pack and if you didn't smoke you could make some good trades.
Don't forget the plastic cheese spread. One of the best was butter beans and ham.
My Dad didn’t smoke, so he made a pretty good side gig for himself while in the Navy!
How can a US Marine eat an MRE without any Crayons?!?!?
Now this is the question that needs answering
Soldier here, I've never seen a Marine eat a meal not including crayons. this is fake news, plain and simple.
What
@@blaizegottman4139 A common joke about the marines is that they eat crayons
@@wwobbles just the red ones though
My God that scene of the soldiers marching and farting with the leaves falling off the tree was brilliant
I couldn’t stop laughing
What are been funnier if one of the guys were a literally screaming at the top of his lungs because his stomach was hurting badly lol
chemical warfare at its deadliest
The enemy- THEY HAVE A POWERFUL WEAPON AHHH-
And the fallen leaves landing on the soldiers is how forest camo was created.
I used to buy MRE's in bulk to eat when I was high, something about the multitude of flavours and menu's made them pretty good looking to a stoner.
Ended up with the Omelette one time. Even after a few hours of blazing I still couldn't stomach that atrocity. As anyone who's ever had the munchies will tell you, pretty much everything looks edible after a session, so that was a real achievement by the MRE "chefs". Ha ha.
Can relate
Kudos to the dude who had to do the animations for this episode. A truly heroic effort
I was in the Army from 2005-2010. Thankfully I was only ever given the vomlet once. I couldn't finish it. However, all the wonderful sides were great and I was still full at the end of chow.
I had joined in 09'. I have had it a couple times. I was the guy with an iron stomach (and fattest guy too). I managed to trade a bag of skittles for $20. I could barely palate the Veg Omelet. Even Drill Sergeants would call out if we were issued them, we were allowed to trade them in for a different random one.
Another Item that was usually reviled, was the Vanilla, Chocolate, and Strawberry Instant Milkshakes, which if i had to guess, were actually protein powder. I loved em, and even better i could get them from my platoon, no equivalent barter required. I loved those, I lost a grand total of 3 lbs in basic, from 223 to 220. prbly gained muscle mass but still. I ate good and came out on top in MRE bartering.
Not military but one of my friends who was challenged me to eat a vomlette, I could barely eat a quarter before I got sick, later once I wasn’t blasting out of both ends we went outside and shot it
I was in 2008-2014 and I think I seen the cheese and veggie omelet a few times into 2010/2011 but that's likely the last ones going through circulation. Tried it once thinking everyone was exaggerating only to find out otherwise.
When my dad was in Iraq, he said the worst smell in the whole country was the porta John. The second worst was the truck that emptied it. This was made even worse with the fact that the defact or mess tent was right next to it. He said you would smell the defact first, and get hungry. As you got closer you'd start smelling the porta John. Then you weren't hungry anymore.
What he may not have mentioned was how we emptied them into a burn pit, added diesel and burned it along with other trash. That scent would carry over the whole fob. I was lucky to not have been assigned to the burn pits to stir it but most were at one point or another.
@@ItsMavicBrah no. He did not mention that. I don't think he had that particular experience.
Why did you let private potato install you porta potties next to the mess hall?
@@tavernburner3066 at what point did I say "me"? I wasn't there. I just read you handle. Now it makes sense.
@@manicmechanic448 okay, why did your dad let private potato put the porta potty next to the mess hall?
I got a Thai chicken MRE once during a deployment , and when I took the first spoonful, there was a whole chickens foot in it , claws and all. True story.
Some cultures do eat them, and they are completely edible. My dad loves them, and I've eaten them at my grandmother's house.
In Asia is commonly normal to eat chicken paws😮😊😅😂
That’s quite normal chicken feet are commonly eaten whole in a dish granted westerners probably arnt used to it
Chicken feet are normal food anywhere else except the western world. People in asia, africa, and south america enjoys eating chicken feet normally because it is actually delicious, chicken feet soup is amazing, western people saying it's disgusting yet keeps eating another disgusting animals such as pigs, which arguably way more disgusting than chicken.
We call it Phoenix Claws (鳯爪) in Mandarin and they're a common cuisine in several Chinese/ Southeast Asian regions. It's pretty gelatinous at first taste but you'd get used to it after a while. People who say they're disgusting are just ignorant XD
One of my online friends is an art teacher from America and we talked about MREs once. She admitted that she had tried a few with her sister when they were younger. Some were fine, others, she said, tasted like wet cardboard.
Even the veggie omelet that replaced the omelet in 2010 was still a horror. When I was in basic one private had one and later that day literally killed a toilet. They had to replace the pipes and the toilet.
Hope that poor toilet was givin a proper send off
@@halo129830at this point you might as well give that toilet a purple heart
Great work soldier
What happened in that unfortunate private to cause that much damage to a toilet and the plumbing?
@@simplyaregularguy131 don't know how but the private survive and didn't get recycled. No punishment but everyone in that company never ate the omelet after that.
Back in my days, we had this stuff called "Soylent Green". Tasted pretty good, but I'm told my experience was unique, since it varied from person to person.
👏👏👏
Surely just an innocent meal and nothing else.
Search for ""Soylent mint chocolate". Yes is a real consumer product and its green.
"SOYLENT GREEN IS BEE-BOOOOOOLE!!!"
*Queue dramatic end music*
@@WarPigstheHun 😉 Let's just keep that our little secret.
I had a buddy in the Canadian military who said the salmon MREs were hated by everyone. One medic told him the inside of the package looked like a human lung
🤢🤢🤢
I've never been in the military but I did buy one of the 'Vomlet' MRE's from a Military Surplus store... And yeah... I still can get that horrendous taste out of my mouth...
Biscuit brown had a rather unfortunate effect on one of my squad mates, so much so we always put him at the rear of our line when patrolling on exercise
Lmao, now i know where I would be in a patrol line!
Was Biscuit Browns the only rations you guys received? 😅
There still in the ration packs now
@@thatperformer3879 oh no we had many wonderful items designed to plug you up for a couple of days
Boil in the bag hash was my favourite, and the ever present boiled sweets (mostly green)
I guess I could see why it has the word “brown” at the end lol
"An inferior grade of garbage."
I'm going to start using that one 🤣
Thats like the best definition of your ex gf
4:31 Roosevelt was lucky to have survived THAT experience.
5:40 BAHAHAHAHA. the trees are dieing!
I have been in the Army for almost 20 years now and I have always made it a point to at least try each MRE entrée. To date, the Vomelette is the only one I could never force down and the reason is that its mere texture...let alone the taste...immediately induced uncontrolled dry heaving. I don't think I could have swallowed it if I had wanted to and, if I had been able to, it certainly wouldn't have stayed down for long.
Marine here...and yeah...if the taste didn't get you...the texture was what did it. As a combination...inedible. The trick, for me at least, was if it sounded like something that might come in a Chef Boyardee can...it was probably safe. Chili mac was the hands down favorite in my time...and nothing beats the jalapeno cheese.
I ended up developing a trick for the vomelette. It only required three of the miniature bottles of tobasco to make edible. The extra desert was key to securing those extra hot sauce bottles. When all you can taste is hot sauce, everything is edible. Also seeing as I never liked candy to begin with, I'd often just trade for more peanut butter or jalapeno/bacon cheese spread no matter what candy I got. That stuff was a life saver.
"Let's get this on a tray... NOT nice!"
@@patron8597 Lmao. Brilliant. 😂😂😂
Lol; I loved the fruitcake bars and making strong coffee with multiple packets. Most of the MRE entrees were horrible, always glad to see peanut butter and crackers.
SteveMre1983 channel reviews MREs. He's tried Civil War Era hard tack, 1901 Army rations, tons of WW2 Era rations. He even holds the record for smoking the world's oldest cigarettes (i believe he still holds that record). Can't recommend his channel enough. NICE!
Is he alive
@@blaizegottman4139 Very much so
I'm happy he actually ate them so they didn't go to waste I've seen other channels where they opened the tins but didn't eat them meaning they'd just get thrown out I just asked ""Why not just keep them and not open them"?
Nice!
He hasn't posted for over a year. Ended up unsubscribing...
7:15 moral of the story: Don't Mess with the Coffee formula.
I actually had the omelet mre in 2012 when I was in infantry Training Battalion, I liked it, the sides were great and if you used the pecante and Tabasco together it tasted fine, but I was so calorie starved at the time I would've eaten any food you put in front of me happily.
They gave you tobacco to eat?
@Melinda Cadarette lol I meant Tabasco
bro is NOT Terrare💀
Man I remember when I went in in 2017. The worst was switching from MREs to real food. It turned into a mad dash to the head as your body could not handle the real food
Definitely can understand about that, you spend eating basically mystery meat or whatever for like who knows how many years, and then you’re returning back to the real food with the nervous system, and fits a bone intact type of meat
I'm so glad the Swiss army usually serves real food.
Recently they tried to hand us some Swedish or Norvegian MREs, the only edible ones were the vegetarian options because meat doesn't handle too well beeing freeze dried. We soldiers said that if they tried to serve us that garbage again instead of the canned chilli con carne (previous ration, the MREs were ment to replace it)
, we'd refuse to work. It worked and I've not seen them since (I assume the feedback to this "food" was similar all across the army).
The canned chilli con carne is the ration that was introduced in the 60s, it's very yummy. I've taken home some excess cans and used it as a pasta sauce.
@@etuanno we should be following the Swiss' example
Excellent video! My biology professor (back in the 1980's) recalled his duty service in the Army in Korea when he would heat C-ration cans of spaghetti over the truck heaters and drain the excess grease before they could eat them. Another C-ration was beef "stew" which used beef heart and if you ate it in the dark, it tasted fine but in daylight my professor recalled seeing valves and other grisly bits from the chopped up beef hearts which turned off the appetite. Course, both of these C-rations were edible compared to what I just saw here.
“These rations are from the Korean war!”
“Still tastes like creamed corn...”
“It’s deviled ham!”
@@Minotaur-ey2lg LMAO
@@Minotaur-ey2lg someone shoot buckman out a torpedo tube
Easting in the dark. Move over Bruce Springsteen.
They must have replaced that with the spiced beef I had in the 1980's. It tasted ok, just ok. One night I am eating it and another guy walks up an says "whatcha eating?" He shined his flashlight with the red lense down into my can. I look at it and it looks like Alpo in the red light. I was unable to finish it.
I can't believe the MRE Beef Patty didn't make the list. This thing was like a dehydrated piece of Salsbury Steak and would only rehydrate in hot water, which we never had in the field. We used to call this thing the Brillo Pad.
I liked it. Just break it up and stick in mouth. There was also a pork patty. I miss them.
It's interesting how these either prevented brown from being eliminated or made liquid brown flow uncontrollably. As such, it would be nice if they included some kind of softener/harderner supplement that could be taken depending on effect. I'm sure their medical personnel help with that stuff though
there's a thing called "pork fat" which is literally a pork fat without any meat in it in some of russian MREs
soldiers usually use it for polishing their boots or for making candles instead of eating it
You mean Salo?
@@libertatemadvocatus1797 sure
Mmm maybe there the rumor's of soldiers dipping their bullet tips in pork fat before fighting Muslims origins from?
But, it is also used instead of oil for frying meat etc.
3:00 is that the medic from tf2?
"and the only one that can be safely recommended"
I tried fermented mare's milk when I visited some very friendly strangers living on the Mongolian steppe. I developed an allergic reaction to it soon after, and given that we were at least a hundred miles from the closest hospital, that was a pretty exciting experience!
I mean if your not allergic to it your fine!
@@legion6211 haha sure yeah i just meant that drinking fermented milk for the first time in the middle of nowhere wasn't the brightest idea. it's not like i knew i would be allergic to it
@@plumofgreatrighteousness You never tried kefir?
Just make sure the horse is a mare, otherwise you'll get a different protein.
In the Canadian Forces, around 2010, we had an "omelette with mushroom sauce" also called a lung in a bag. It tasted as good as it looked.
NO!
I read in a memoir of a paratrooper who said the only thing worse than being at Bastogne was being fed British rations at Bastogne. He particularly loved eating half frozen oxtail soup.
I remember eating biscuit browns on cadets, we all knew "rat packs" made you constipated but I never realised how much until I got home that weekend.
Also the energy powder was snorted by... "special" cadets so it earned the nickname "Screech"
What a time cadets was 😂
I remember an absolutely rancid ration pack main of beef burrito made me throw up on a field craft weekend.
Cheers dits
@@laddiewink9895 I had one too, absolutely disgusting.
I also had a really nice ration pack (I think it contained pasta and a lovely pudding, can’t remember…) once on a fieldcraft camp. I placed to down to sort out some cadets and someone nicked it. Absolutely gutted.
@@NaCl1252 the worst thing in a field craft that happened to me was my first weekend on fieldcraft when I didn't know what was good and what wasn't. So I swapped this nice sausage and bean thing for the burrito. Worst decision of my life.
i was a cadet in the 2000's so have good memories of that period ration packs, wasn't a fan of biscuit brown myself, absolutely loved biscuit fruit though. I saw SteveMRE's video on a nowadays 24hr ration pack and my first thought was 'where's the food?' as it all looked like snacks etc rather than the 3 boil in the bags, oatmeal block, 2 packs biscuits etc. that you got in the 2000's era ration packs.
Freeze dried pork patties. Was on a bare base deployment in 83 where we got a mixture of the brand new MREs and old canned rations. The pork patties were discussing until we figured out to team up with someone that got the cans where we would scrape off the fat from top of can and fry the pork patty in the fat. The only good thing about the freeze dried meats were that since they were light the sides were very moist.
The spiritual successor is the US Army pork rib MRE. There must be a suspicious lack of stray cats near where that thing is manufactured.
As someone moist i can relate to that
were those called "slab o' pork"? those were gross.
@@thejohnbeck The only name we gave them I can not repeat here. The freeze dried beef patties were only slightly less gross. The first few days we could not have fires so trying to reconstitute them resulted in half the patty becoming a mush and half staying crunchy.
Roger that. I disliked the pork patties and the beef patties. No matter how much water you soaked them in they were tough and crunchy.
Timestamps (minus the sponsorship):
0:00 Intro
0:24 Biscuit Browns
2:27 Cheese and Veggie Omelette (The Vomlet)
3:32 Enbalmed Beef
4:47 Maconochie's Stew
6:01 Essence of Coffee
7:22 "Premium Quality" Beef
8:46 Horse Blood and Fermented Horse Milk
lol
@Not PC yes
It's said the most disturbing thing about Ranger School is witnessing another starving man inhaling a cold Cheese and Veggie Omelet while moaning in pleasure.
Your animation gets better and better with each passing video. Been a long time since I've seen a crowd of people all performing the same action in unison over and over. Keep it up, mac, the quality definitely shows.
its all just short animations on loop
@@xtra_1807 STILL BETTER
There's a special place in my heart for the instant coffee packets.
The grinder in the the back of the sharps carbine was actually very real. But its original intention is kinda muddy. Most historians believe it was actually intended to grind charcoal for black powder or to regrind powder that was exposed to moisture and allowed to dry. But it ended up being used to grind coffee beans. Pretty neat
Singapore Armed Forces here. Worst MRE: Glutinous Chicken Rice.
First had it during basic back in 2001.
Voted the worst item by servicemen all over, but it survived the test of time and is still available now
I got through 3 spoonfull bites of the veggie omelette before I had to stop myself from vomiting.
Thanks Fort Polk 2008
Generals: "We need something to break the stalemate on the Western Front!"
Army Cooks: "How about a canned stew that turns our soldiers' farts into poison gas?"
Generals: "GENIUS!"
That was the start of chemical warfare in WWI
You guys are awesome, thank you for all you do really appreciate it!!!!
As a former Marine. ..the omelet that's Green. Not one Marine ate it. Any enemy could eat it. We gave it to prisoners of war. Vegetable omelet.
Dude, isn't torture of P.O.W.s a violation of the Geneva Suggestions?
This reminds me that I should be thankful for my completely plain and normal food 😅
For me honestly but definitely grab one of those like pork and beef type Emery‘s, put it inside of a freaking Dell and make a meat pie out of it lol
im ok with that las entry about horse blood drink, but everything else is just a health violation
@@wilsonweiseng6485 lol to be honest, I didn't find the horse blood sucking super appealing either 🙈
@@Reaper_Rapi I have no idea what Emery's or a Dell is, but it all sounds dirty and delicious lol
Biscuits Brown came in a green pack, also in every pack you'd get biscuits fruit, they were in a red pack, we used to say Red to go and green to stop if you get what I mean. It kind of balanced out
When my unit would pass out MREs, it was like being dealt a hand in poker. The vomlet was like having been dealt a 2/7 offsuit, while the chili mac was like being dealt a royal flush.
Totally. The Chili Mac was the best.
1:29 relatable
The first MRE I ever received in the Army Reserve was Ham and Chicken Loaf, flaked chicken and ham pressed into a square brick. It gave me horrible gas and I literally never saw another one of this entree. It must not have lasted long.
My favorite MRE was the Ham Slice, because it included chocolate nut cake.
It was either that or eating the block the vomit
The ham and chicken loaf was in the first generation of MREs and was out of production by 1991.
Personally I liked the ham and chicken loaf
@@Reaper_Rapi those dehydrated pork and beef patties were atrocious
We called the ham and chicken loaf, ham and choke loaf. Marine GySgt 1984 to 2004.
Worst mre for me was the vegetarian stuff and vegan crackers. When we closed down the fobs in Iraq in 2011 we left them behind for the Iraqi army. That might be why they still hate us lol
I'm pretty sure Iraqis will hate you more if you left them with non-halal food instead.
@@triadwarfare we also left the toilets clogged up too. Good times
If you were unlucky enough to pull a cruddy MRE you could try and trade away the main course. If there were no takers you could toss it and check the "extras" box and likely put something together with the extra Peanut Butters or Cheeses that other folks didn't want. It wasn't ideal but worked in a pinch.
The only benefit of the vomelet was that whoever got it would almost certainly not eat it. If you could stomach it, you could get an extra main course pretty easily. BTW cheese tortellini was the best mre (main course) hands down.
Ramsay: “IT’S RAW”
Nein
No kidding
Haha
Nein
🤭🤣
There actually was a rifle with a coffee grinder built into the stock. I don’t think it was ever issued to the troops though. I believe the manufacturer Sharps had heard about the soldiers grinding coffee with the butts of their rifles, built one as a prototype. I think a few other examples might be found as well.
It was indeed
i've seen more than one sharps with a grinder, as to their authenticity, no clue
Only 12 were ever produced, and most are in museums. But if you find a real one they worth 50 thousand dollars. Also I believe the real intent was to grind horse feed as it was a cavalry gun.
Of course soldiers tried grinding coffee but it wasn't designed for it. 90% of any you will see are replicas
I understood the grinders in the rifle stocks were to keep the troopies from using their rifle butts to pulverize coffee and corn. Saw it on Sons of Guns.
In 2009 the vomelette was still in mre pallets. Since it had a 5 year shelf life give or take you had a chance of getting one all the way up until 2014. I got lucky and we never had any show up in a crate after about 2011 due to where my unit was located. High humidity kept them from keeping stuff down here long term.
I laughed waaaay to hard about Maconochie stew then I should. 😂
We had a Joke (that seemed to be somewhat based in reality) in the Aussie Army, that the 4 versions of the Ration Packs, 3 were designed to plug you up, and the 4th to Unplug you (hence why you saved up the 3 pieces of toilet paper you got in each pack). Problem being you never got them in order.... I still miss the canned processed cheese.
In my day in the U.S Army we use to fold the little toilet pack and rip a hole out of the center. You used your finger and then the rest to wipe it off. Off course we were joking but they never gave enough TP.
@@lisam4503 yes, i've heard that one too! 🤣
Yeah, they also had the F.R.E.D. the clean version is "Frikkin Ridiculous Eating Device" which is a legend all to itself... Too short to be a useful spoon, though the extra thumb purchase of the can opener bit was no doubt appreciated.
@@jon-paulfilkins7820 I still have 2 in the cutlery draw, best can opener ever :D
@@1978sjt Ive tasted the aussie MREs before. As another countrys soldier, can confirm i was super envious of the CHEESE. The kiwis had a tube of condensed milk that was nice too
The "Embalmed Meat" story is epic! A presidential act getting passed due to the results.
Theodore Roosevelt was a soldier before he was president. I can just imagine him taking one bite/sniff and getting pissed off that they were actually serving this to troops.
@@kevinmencer3782 indeed! "They don't make em like that anymore" is a quote probably said with him in mind.
Well there were a few other influences on the act, but yes.
I had once eaten the Canadian version of the Vomlet. The IMP Ham Omelette. Same effect. I believe they discontinued them after our involvement in Somalia because the high heat made the... erm.. reaction even worse. It came back a decade later, "improved", but quickly disappeared from the menu again AFAIK.
The vomlette. I have never been a picky eater and I was always able to eat anything in a MRE. Usually the flavor ranges from "meh" to "hospital bland". But those things....I opened the pouch and my first thought at seeing it was water soaked drywall. Didn't get past one bite.
8:35 of course they did. God forbid they reward honesty for once...
God forbid they even be honest
A TH-cam Creator never looks like how you expect. Another great video, thank you!
Got a chuckle when the Omelet came up. I use to look for them specifically for the sweets inside, though they were always reeses pieces. The USMC was still giving them out while I was deployed in 2011-2012, so hearing they had been discontinued in '09 seems pretty on brand for the Marines.
I could not stop laughing while watching this video and listening to the audio description. 😂
There's a chicken curry MRE. Someone who did the Duke of Edinburgh award brought one in on lunch and as teenagers of course we tasted it. It was like mildly spicy cardboard
MREs in general are massively underseasoned to appeal to the lowest common denominator. A lot of soldiers carry seasoning packets on campaign.
@@Nerathul1 And HP sauce.
That pronunciation of ‘McConnachie’ was truly unworldly!!!😂😂😂that alone made me want to subscribe…..
I remember back when Hurricane Katrina hit, my grandpa got boxes of MREs when he went into town a few days after it hit. My brother and I were fascinated with the heating bag you add water to and we loved the selections of MREs. I especially loved the ones with the pound cakes in them. I also remember my mom said that my dad didn’t care for any of the meals because they made him constipated.
3:55 the fish did not like it
I had a vomlet one time back in 06, I ate about half of it because I was super hungry and just forced it down. My first clue that I should have just skipped it and ate the sides was the smell as it was just ugh and then I got so violently ill from it that I though I was going to seriously tear my throat from throwing up so much, and don't even get me started on how raw my backside was from having what felt like the worst case of the runs in my life. It was one of if not the worst thing I have ever eaten in my entire life. Seriously make a few hundred boxes of them then drop those over Russian lines in Ukraine and the war will be over by summer, all the Russians will die from food poisoning then again using biological weapons is against the laws of war.
Sounds like those MREs were produced by the enemy to attack US servicemen. If I was in the army, I would have rounded up the all and dropped them on the enemy.
Goddamn good idea😮😊😅😂
@@guytech7310Goddamn good idea😮😊😅😂
“Hundreds of men breaking wind” 😅
Thank you Simple History for always using kid-friendly language in your videos. My kids quite enjoyed this one
8:47 Oh yes, part of the complete balance breakfast
"Let's get this out on to a tray"
"Nice"
I hope he uploads another video soon.
It didn't matter if you used all your salt and pepper. All your tobasco sauce. It didn't matter if you heated it up or ate it cold. It didn't matter if you tried eating it with a bite of all the side dishes. The veggie omelette gave me more PTSD than my actual tour. I was 11B. Infantry. I saw that omelette break many a man worse than a drill sergeant. I saw a guy cry once when receiving one. He was going through a lot at the time and I swear that omelette was his breaking point. We had to put him on safety watch and take his weapon. None of this is a joke.
11 Bravo crying because of vomelet? Damn, it must've been horrible.
@@babyramses5066 🤣 just telling a story. No need to be antagonistic. Of course there were worse times. But I didn't think telling a story about those worse times was appropriate for this channel or this particular subject matter. I made it a little dark because that particular MRE was mentioned. Now you can tell your unrelated war stories. I'd love to hear em honestly. ❤️
Surprised the Spartan staple "black broth", blood and boiled pig's leg, seasoned with vinegar, didn't make the list. An Athenian once quipped that, after tasting it, "it was no great thing for the Spartans to seek death in the wars in order to escape so many hardships and such a wretched life as theirs." - Plutarch's life of Pelopidas
I mean it's a blood stew reserved for barbarians, not a the civilized people of Greece who would feast on cheese, lentils, dried fish, olives and freshly hunted meat on the march. The only missing from the black broth would be something likely cassava flour to thicken the stew
I've heard this voice so many times... it's always funny seeing the person it comes out of cos theyre never what you expected 😂
I know right! 😉
I remember that we actually used the Vomlette as targets for M2 .50 cal and M240b range.
Former Navy. The most imposing, intimidating man i ever met was a Devil Dog. He was 6'6", solid muscle, hanging out with two other marines and a few sailors in Hangar Bay 2 (CVN-75) while we were in transit to the Middle East. I cant lie, my first thought was "I am so happy he's on my side". Never felt so afraid of a man like that since. I was eager to meet him so i introduced myself to the fellas and when he shook my hand, yall his energy completely disarmed me. Nicest, kindest soul you could meet. Southern boy, I could tell and he had the energy of a big brother or old friend. Never could remember his name or the conversation being that happened over 12 years ago but i never forgot the moment. It's true that they are the greatest friend and worst enemy you could ever have.
After 23 years in the Army i can still say my first ever MRE remained my most hated. Chicken ala king was nasty and even with "improvements" it remained so.
One of my most hated MRE entrees was the "Beef in Jamaica Sauce". Utterly vile.
ive never laughed so f**king hard than at @5:47
I'm surprised the lima bean and ham they gave soldiers in Vietnam wasn't mentioned. I've heard so many say that stuff was horrible
"Ham and Motherfuckers" Not a favorite of anyone but it was edible. Better than dog food for sure.
I was wondering when that one would come up. Strangely enough, I enjoyed that one. A little Tabasco and it was fine. The gas produced on the other hand, I could have done without.
I was in the Army, 81-87. We got the canned stuff in Basic Training. Lima beans from the Vietnam era were terrible C rats to get. Also, the ham and eggs from the 1950s they gave us had turned green. Green eggs and ham, literally. None of us died, so they were still edible.
Later, our MREs were luxurious by comparison.
@@alanhyt79 What a fun time to eat US Army rations. I went in in 1982. I remember C rats. One day I got the dreaded ham and eggs. I had just finished personal hygiene. It was cold and dark. I thought "no wonder everyone hates these. They're so salty and there's like an iron taste too". The sergeant major walked by. He never liked me much but he walked over to me and pounded me on the shoulder and said "l like that boy! That's mean!" He was never so happy I thought, but why? The guy across from me was shaking his head, and finally pointed to his chin, then me. I felt my chin. It was wet. The sun was just coming up. I looked down. My can of ham and eggs was full of blood. My blood. I had cut my chin vertically down the middle while shaving with a one blade disposable razor and was bleeding into my breakfast. I didn't feel it because it was so cold.
@@marksnyder8022 SGM thought you were hardcore, eating C rats covered in blood. Or maybe he thought you had opened the can using only your mouth. Sergeant Majors are a trip. LOL
Omg, this episode was hilarious 😂😂
We used the Biscuits Brown to mortar each other's shell scrape, that's how much we liked them. The biscuits fruit or oat blocks, however....FANTASTIC!.
oh yes..when I was serving in Croatian army we had those same biscuits,we called them "rambo cookies" 'cause they had like camouflaged wrapper haha we used to start a fire in ovens with them
I worked at an all natural pet supply store. One of my bosses was explaining that there were a few things sold in the store fit for human consumption. But that mostly was the dried apple treats.
Tbh if it was an apocalypse and a human is stuck in a pet food store u will probably still survive
@Chadwick Gainsberg I had a freind that would taste his cats wet food and he told me some of the stuff tasted like good quality Paté
I believe in germany all pet food must be technically safe for humans
@@the_retag we did carry one brand that was made in Italy and thus it had an EU seal of approval.
I think the FDA requires dog food to be safe for human consumption as well