To Buy Army MRE's or Not?

[FlashPan]

Hello all,

I have a small variety of pre-packaged food stored up (tins etc). 1 part are 10 boxes of British Army 24 hours RAT packs (for bugging in). I've had these for about 10 years now and never touched or opened the boxes.

After watching this vid:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YjId8bH9_CE

and the general review of the quality of food from 12 years old was ok, it made me think if it was time to upgrade/replace the 10 boxes I have?

I understand the quality can be affected by how the RATs are stored (mine for instance at normal unheated room temp out of direct sun light). Looking on the bay I can find 10 in date boxes with about 2 year "official" shelf life for about £100 delivered.

Am now wondering is this still a good way to go? Am I better buying individual foods or other packs?

One thing I liked about the 24 hour packs was that they were a little but fire and forget. Long storage life, enough food for at least 10 days (am aware they contain a lot more cals something like 6,000 whereas a normal civy would only need 3,000 - when I was single I thought I could stretch these to 20 days, now am married aback to 10), easy to store and split up/carry if needed. Plus the cost of approx. £10 for 3 meals/drinks and all the extra little bits and pieces sound good.

Open for debate

Cheers

PS: Sorry I forgot one main point...longevity of capable food storage is also quite key to me.

[Yorkshire Andy]

£100 would buy you a whole host of tinned and dried food from the supermarket...

The rat packs are a bit Marmite as in there are some god awful meals in some boxes....


I do have 4 24hr boxes (one in the car one in my "bug out bag" ) and a couple in the outhouse (cool and dark)

I rotate a couple of boxes yearly when backpacking or camping

The good old store what you eat ... Eat what you store makes a lot of sence

You can get a much more ballenced diet from supermarket stuff....

Random examples:

https://groceries.morrisons.com/webshop ... n+casserol

https://groceries.morrisons.com/webshop ... n+casserol



https://groceries.morrisons.com/webshop ... ay+breakfa

https://groceries.morrisons.com/webshop ... Htin+curry


Then if you must have pouches


https://groceries.morrisons.com/webshop ... t+we+found




Add to your stash rice, mash potato , pasta, tinned veg and fruit

You can live and eat fairly well

[Deeps]

There's also my current obsession, dehydrating and vac sealing your own 'normal' meals. Youtube can be very helpful for inspiration too.

[sethorly]

and the general review of the quality of food from 12 years old was ok

2004 was 12 years ago? *sobs*

At the moment my food prep is insufficient as I've been trying to work out exactly what my family really needs, so I'll be following this thread with interest. I've discounted dehydration as I just don't have the time.

[gamekeeper752]

ha who can forget "babies heads" ,the tin of spam, oat biscuits and a mars bar so solid you would be sh*tting it out for a week afterwards, but I agree get your stuff on a rota replacement from the nearest super marche.
I've started doing this it seems cheaper and I can chose what I want to eat working on 2000 cals per day, as I am quite confident on top up if necessary.

[BlinkingCory]

ha who can forget "babies heads" ,the tin of spam, oat biscuits and a mars bar so solid you would be sh*tting it out for a week afterwards, but I agree get your stuff on a rota replacement from the nearest super marche.
I've started doing this it seems cheaper and I can chose what I want to eat working on 2000 cals per day, as I am quite confident on top up if necessary.

Yup! And biscuits brown with the wee tin of pate. That may well have been dogfood on a slab of MDF.
Of course the packs are convenient, but IMHO they are silly expensive, offer lack of long term variety and some of the meals are cack. Besides that, we mostly eat what we prep/store. Once a week is a 'preppers' dinner to help rotate stocks, something that would be difficult or silly to do (for us) with rat packs.

Having said that, I can understand the peace of mind that a lot of them stored away brings.

My neighbour has a pallet of them. Bought from official MOD website I believe. I can't remember exactly how much he paid, but I can remember thinking, WOW, that's cheap.

[FlashPan]

Thanks for the advice guys.

Am in 2 minds which also leads to being between a small rock and hard place.

The Mrs knows I do "some" prepping and has some tinned stuff already but the way she looks at me, it's more of a hobby (the prepping not me....well I hope ). If I start more frequently buying in stuff she may start to object a little.

I know we have to help ourselves to help ourselves in the future but we do very little supermarket shopping as well.

That being said I understood that the MREs can become (or in part) un-edible but am still drawn to the amount of food you can get in a compressed size?

Maybe we can start a competition to see if anyone can build a shop/supermarket bought version of a British 24 hr MRE? .....actually as well as a bit of a giggle I think it could be a good exercise in choosing foods for 3 meals a day and similar cal count and seeing how close it is in physical size?

[sethorly]

Due to being self-contained, compact, morale-uplifting and extremely high in calories, a perfect match for MREs is surely the BoB or INCH, perhaps even a GHB for over, say, 72 hours. 3000-5000 calories sounds about right for a 10 hour march.

I imagine freeze-dried foods (eg. Mountain House) with their 25 year lifespan would be best for long term. Lower cost than MREs per calorie with a much longer lifespan.

Then cans/dehydrated stuff/carb-sources for the first couple of years.

if anyone can build a shop/supermarket bought version of a British 24 hr MRE?

Here's one place to start - it's a ration pack ingredient list - but not military: http://www.goodfoodandgifts.co.uk/ratio ... enu-a.html

[FlashPan]

That's interesting about mountain warehouse food. I did not know it lasted that long...or is it a case that it "can" be stored for 25 yrs but not designed to like the MREs?

Thanks for the link as well; I take it this is freeze dried ?

Am guessing that the only downside to freeze dried that springs to my mind is that you need to have a good water or use your existing bottled supply to help cook/prepare them? Shame I cannot see any expiry dates as well on that link.

Never used freeze dried myself, although I remember donkeys years agao my mum had a packet of freeze dried ice cream in a cupboard for years, out of the blue decided to make it....tasted like soap....still she made us it it though

[BlinkingCory]

Mmmm
We had a very unusual start to prepping with regard to food stocks.
x14 rat packs were the first purchase as there is the two of us and we wanted a weeks worth of scran to stow away.
After that we bought a weeks worth of tinned etc. The cost is certainly a LOT less and storage space a bit less.
ie.
Breakfast
x2 big bags muesli
x7 tins grapefruit

Lunch
x7 packets spaghetti/pasta
x7 pasta sauce
big tub parmesan

Dinner
x14 tins curry
3KG (overkill) rice
x7 tins mushroom
x7 tins fruit cocktail

Tea/Coffee/Sugar/Dried Milk
Chocolate, snacks, etc

That's how we continued, buying a weeks worth at a time, trying to alter the meal choices to provide us after 12 'shops' with 12 weeks of varied food.
After that we did the usual, buying a crate at a time, now and again of beans, toms, fruits, meats, ready meals, fish, veg etc.
Alongside the water, flour, dried stuff, more rice, pasta, cous cous etc the preps room looks like a corner shop LOL.
For the two of us, there is easily 6 months worth. Excessive for what we prep for, but a nice security blanket.

Advantages of these standard preps over rat packs IMHO
Space - Certainly less room taken than 365ish rat packs, that we'd need for 6 months.
Cost - A lot less
Variety - A lot more
Usability - We constantly dip into the preps and restock

Advantages of rat packs IMHO
Shelf life - Brilliant
Calorie count - 4000 (I think)
No fuel needed - Taste like muck cold, but edible. Nothing needs to be rehydrated etc.

As for designing a 24hr rat pack of 4000 calories, smaller in size than a MOD issue, that's easily done... BUT.... I think it's impossible to do if limited
to shop bought MRE type pouches. I've found them to be low in calories, expensive and at a guess, I wouldn't fancy tucking into a 10yr old shop bought pouch.

It's all horses for courses I suppose.

Sorry, I can waffle on for Britain when I get going.