When my brother belonged to the National Guard, he used to bring home tons of MREs. Some of the entrees were crap, but I liked the cheese spreads and crackers, and there was a chocolate fudge bar that was killer.

Quasar: It's called "The McRib."

Came here to say this. Just buy a bunch of "food" at McDonald's, put it in a ziplock bag, and I'm sure it will look and taste exactly the same in 2 years.

New at Subway....

i remember reading about this project.

the hardest sandwich to make was peanut butter and jelly.

But what about the tomato that leaps out of the car when it senses an impending crash?

It's no Happy Pie. All life on Earth could be dead, and it would still be fresh.

No Mr. Pither references? For shame.

Gulliver: Exactly! No longer will food be squashed, crushed and damaged, by the ignorance and stupidity of the driver! (becoming slightly messianic) Whole picnics will be built to withstand the most enormous forces! Snacks will be safer than ever! An simple pot of salad dressing, treated in our laboratories, has been subjected to the impact of a 4,000 pound steam hammer every day for the last sixteen years and has it broken?
Pither: Er....well...
Gulliver: Yes, of course it has...but there are other ideas - the safety straps for sardines for instance.

Arctic Phoenix: New at Subway....

Damn! Beat me to it!

MrEricSir: Quasar: It's called "The McRib."

Came here to say this. Just buy a bunch of "food" at McDonald's, put it in a ziplock bag, and I'm sure it will look and taste exactly the same in 2 years.

Some guy set a McDonald's burger out for weeks or months and photographed it. It never changed. Never grew mold or rotted.

Lots of salt and other preservatives will keep food for a long time.

Real food isn't meant to last for two-three years...
(Except maybe honey, which can last for thousands of years, if kept airtight)
Real food generally goes bad.

Still tastier than the sandwiches you find at British railway stations.

Just one more thing before we leave formation.

I'm going to make this offer now, up front and I swear to god if anyone tries to cut into my business you'll live to regret it.

I'll do firewatch,
I'll do patrol,
I'll clean,

.... any menial task you have to perform in a day I will do.

.. my payment? Either a MRE pound cake or jalapeno cheese packet.

/they say in the land of the blind the man with one eye is king
//IN THE LAND OF shiatTY MRES, THE MAN WITH POUNDCAKE IS KING!!! MWUAHAHA!!!

Mentos

/the freshmaker

It is called a McMRE...

shivashakti: Real food isn't meant to last for two-three years...
(Except maybe honey, which can last for thousands of years, if kept airtight)
Real food generally goes bad.

Making long lasting food, do one of the following.

1) Stuff it full of so much sugar that nothing can grow on it. (Honey)

2) Stuff it so full of salt that nothing can grow on it. (Salted Fish)

3) Suck so much water out of it that nothing can grow on it. (Jerky)

4) Seal it in an airtight container and boil it.

5) Seal it in an airtight container, and NUKE IT FROM ORBIT.

FuturePastNow: MrEricSir: Quasar: It's called "The McRib."

Came here to say this. Just buy a bunch of "food" at McDonald's, put it in a ziplock bag, and I'm sure it will look and taste exactly the same in 2 years.

Some guy set a McDonald's burger out for weeks or months and photographed it. It never changed. Never grew mold or rotted.

Lots of salt and other preservatives will keep food for a long time.

It has nothing to do with either salt or preservatives. Make your own hamburger of that size with your own ingredients and it won't grow mouldy either. The reason is that it dries out in the air before the mould spores have a chance to grow.

lordargent: Making long lasting food, do one of the following.

1) Stuff it full of so much sugar that nothing can grow on it. (Honey)

2) Stuff it so full of salt that nothing can grow on it. (Salted Fish)

3) Suck so much water out of it that nothing can grow on it. (Jerky)

4) Seal it in an airtight container and boil it.

5) Seal it in an airtight container, and NUKE IT FROM ORBIT.

Sure.
But I have a hard time believing that there's not all sorts of preservatives and dough conditioners and other additives in that "sandwich".

That's amazing! Now, how about you Army geniuses develop a way to get out of Afghanistan before these things expire.

AdolfOliverPanties: [gamification.co image 413x310]

Reclassified as a sandwich.

Leaving satisfied

Let me guess, it was sealed in a Forever-Ware container.

/shouldn't be obscure

PIcture of the Army blueprints:


Also this demonstration of the build:Link (new window)

Difficulty: even if it's still "edibile" (read: will not cause immediate death by food poisoning) after 2 or 3 years, it's still Army food.

Oh Sandwich, how could I stay mad at you?

shivashakti: Sure.
But I have a hard time believing that there's not all sorts of preservatives and dough conditioners and other additives in that "sandwich".

Probably, but then again, it depends on what sort of sandwich it is.

IE, doing any of the above things I listed, alters the food to some degree (the nuclear option, actually altering the food the least I think), especially when you're talking about a sandwich.

1) Stuff it full of so much sugar that nothing can grow on it (a sugary sandwich?)

2) Stuff it so full of salt that nothing can grow on it. (which also makes it inedible to humans, actually, the salted fish I mentioned before is an island dish, you have to soak the fish in water overnight, then throw that water away and soak it overnight in water again, that second soak is the water you cook it in, so basically, you have to get ready to cook it two days in advance).

3) Suck so much water out of it that nothing can grow on it. (no lettuce, no tomatoes, you call that shiat cheese?)

4) Seal it in an airtight container and boil it. (I don't think the heat transfer would work that well with a sandwich, it's definitely not going to be the same coming out of the can, think burger in a can and its ilk)

5) Seal it in an airtight container, and NUKE IT FROM ORBIT. (hmmm)

I have some of these that I ordered. They are more of a waxy coated hot pocket thing with mooshy unidentified filling. They aren't bad if you are really hungry. I got the PB&J and some kind of pork ones.

Nice piroshki.

I didn't see any toy in the package but I gotta say.

Not having to piss on your food to make it edible is dead awesome.
Being able to hold the "whole meal" in your hand while making bang-bang noises rocks.
No spork needed!
You can slop condiments in if you like.
You can roast the sammy over a fire if you like.
You can carry several days worth of food in a bag that isn't shaped like a standard UPS box...

reverendjim
I served in the 70s and we got C-rats left over from the Korean War. You could tell because they had cigarettes. Cigarettes so dry they would catch fire if you tried to light them. Good times.

Isn't that sort of the point of a cigarette?

enry
No Mr. Pither references? For shame.

What's this then, Scotch mist?

Bondith 2011-12-06 09:03:11 PM
But what about the tomato that leaps out of the car when it senses an impending crash?

In light of the BS "Amerika is a battlefield" non-sense, shouldn't we be trying to discourage keeping our troops happy?

"Hands down, the worst MRE made, is the veggie omelet"

Says a soldier to young to remember the Five Fingers of Death.

WARNING TO MASS TAB OPENERS: LOUD AUTO-PLAYING AUDIO IN LINK.

The last sandwich I made lasted only 10 minutes and dripped mayo after that.

/on her boyfriend's request.

//just kidding.

By a curious quirk of chemistry, 20th- and 21st-century MREs with a 10-year shelf-life at 285 Kelvin stop going bad after about seventy years, and very, very slowly start getting better. The 1987-issue Chicken Patty (the "boot heel" which was originally best eaten suddenly, in a surprise assault, or better yet, thrown at the enemy) is particularly exquisite, having turned into a sweet, fluffy pudding by A.D. 2430, and into an actual mousse by 2890.

Jalapeno cheese spread. Amazing stuff. Trying to remember the good ones...chicken alfredo, or ala king maybe? Some kind of chicken and rice w/ a spicy cheese sauce? And the beef stew, or stroganoff?

I never served, but my roomie after I graduated college was in the ANG and brought MREs home on a regular basis. Pretty sure he stole them, but WTH. Great for canoe trips. Watertight, calorie dense, and binds you up good. No one wants mudbutt away from home base.

To be honest, I liked pretty much all of the ones I ate. The tobasco never hurt either. But then again, I never had to eat them every day for months.

Do they eject before impact, though?

Can you use the preservative packet for making thermite?

/just curious.

Karac: "Hands down, the worst MRE made, is the veggie omelet"

Says a soldier to young to remember the Five Fingers of Death.

Heh I liked the FFoD. That and Spaghetti w/ meat sauce.

Last time I ate MRE's I didn't shiat for 6 days and when I did it was like shiatting a concrete pine cone.