MREs (Meals Ready-to-Eat) Genuine U.S. Military Surplus (1 Pack) Assorted Flavor

I bought this back in July 2018 and I just opened it - it's great! I kept the MRE in my car trunk for 6 years through Texas summers and Illinois winters. The flameless ration heater (FRH) still works and nothing was spoiled. Overall, I recommend it. I've listed everything and my opinion below, too.Chili MRE: I recommend buying an extra package so you can try the flameless ration heater (FRH). There are a couple of steps involved in setting this up and the bag gets hot. However, I did it pretty easily with instructions, just be careful with the heater and squeezing the chili out of the pouch...it's hot! The chili tastes good, it's salty with some spice. It's about as much food as a can of chili from the store and comes with a nice long spoon.Vegetable cracker: 2 large crackers break into 4 smaller crackers each. I ate this with the cheese spread. The cracker was good, cheese was thick. Used a sharp knife to open.Cornbread: surprisingly good. I expected bland and dry cornbread, but it was sweet and moist. Almost like a dessert bread. Nicely done.Cheese crackers: I expected Cheezits, but these are Combos. Really nice surprise, cheddar cheese-stuffed cylindrical crackers. Tasty.Beverage bag: basically a plastic bag to hold water and drink mix (coffee and orange juice). You can place the beverage bag in the FRH bag with MRE to heat up coffee. However, just one beverage bag for both coffee and orange juice...I would purchase and carry one of those silicone collapsible cups.Orange juice: powdered drink mix with 20 grams sugar. I would mix this first in the beverage bag before coffee. Then pour into separate cup. Sugar clumped up in mixing bag and juice tasted like a Vitamin C drink mix, just ok.Instant coffee: Most disappointing of the package. Very little coffee and it did not smell or taste good. However, plenty of non-dairy creamer and sugar included.Other stuff: about 15 small napkins for cleanup or fire tinder. Pack of 20 matches also included. Cheap matches, they won't stay lit very long, but they work. Moist towelette was very moist, tore apart as I unraveled it. Will clean your hands and surfaces. Iodized salt packet with lots of salt. Two pieces of chewing gum not super sweet, nice spearmint flavor.

From what I can tell, it's the real deal, reminds me of the ones a friend of my dad's gave me when I was a little kid. I remember them being very filling then and still are. Haven't eaten everything from it but so far so good. The seller I got them from was contracting LLC, they were made by wornick and the date code puts them made in March of 2022, so well within the shelflife. unfortunately I couldn't find a date code anywhere outside the package, only after I opened which defeats the purpose of keeping a few for emergencies and rotating out based on age. Not the cheapest pricewise to keep in my hunting pack or vehicle but not too badUpdate: Now that i have eaten everything in it (not the drinks), I can honestly say, "not bad". I got menu 13, which is unfortunately vegetarian, but it didn't taste vegetarian if you know what I mean. it didn't include the reses pieces or energy bar or apple pieced like the picture showed though. It included trail mix, entree, accessory pack, crackers, peanut butter, and smoked almonds. The tortellini tasted a lot like chef boyardee ravioli. The trail mix and crackers were dry making me thirsty, but not bad tasting. Again the main gripe is that there was no visible marking that I was able to find to let me know the age of this until I opened it, breaking the seal and essentially rendering a rotation for freshness impossible

The MRE was delivered in good shape and the Beef Goulash tastes pretty good. Meal was dated from 2019 and the only issue was the flameless ration heater no longer worked.

Please read on for an MRE recipe that's pretty ingenious...After serving as a chaplain in the Guard for 6 years I have had plenty of experience eating MRE's. When I was a Boy Scout they took us for a camping trip and we had C Rations. I thought it was a great experience because I felt like I was in the Army. Let me tell you that MRE's are a great improvement over c rats. As an officer I always had enlisted personnel eat first so I would wind up with what ever wasn't chosen by the majority. You had to have a fire or sterno can to cook the c rat entree, which was in a can. That meant having to lug that around and if you didn't have a can opener then you had to use your knife. With MRE's there is a heat pouch that you put your entree pouch in and pour a small amount of water in it and return it to the entree box with it leaning against something like a rock. The water causes a chemical reaction with the powder sealed in the heater pouch and that thing gets super hot really quick and cooks your entree in a couple of minutes. The biggest drawback, which always happened to me, is that you have to be very careful opening the top of the pouch or the super hot steam would burn you. I always got burned because for some reason I couldn't open the flap and get my hand out of the way. Lol. I look back at it and laugh now but it wasn't funny then. I say all that to explain that you can have a hot meal in a matter of minutes with an MRE. They're great to have in the field and a great emergency food source. The entree is printed on the outside of the pouch so you know what your getting before opening it. And if you got one you didn't like then hopefully you can find someone to trade with. I've seen some interesting things offered to entice a trade. LolThe most interesting thing to me is that you saw guys bragging about what dessert they got like M&Ms, a candy bar and in my experience the most coveted was pound cake over what their entree was.Now for the recipe. In the field you are often staying awake for long periods of time. To sleep while on guard duty was a serious offense and during war you could be shot for it. As a chaplain I didn't have to pull guard duty but would be awake during fire watch sometimes as this was a good time to get to know the soldiers in my care. I'm not a coffee drinker as I'm not a fan of hot beverages so I missed out on the coffee caffeine. Inside an MRE there is a tiny bottle of Tabasco sauce and I have seen soldiers rub it under their eyes to help them stay awake. I have even heard of some putting it in their eyes but I never personally saw that. Inside an MRE you get a condiment pack that contains Tabasco sauce, instant coffee, cocoa powder, sugar, salt/pepper, coffee creamer, a ration of toilet paper and a pack of 2 Chiclets which children overseas love. There is a dish you can make called "Ranger Pudding". I don't know if the Rangers actually came up with the recipe but that's what it's called. To make it you open your packet of cocoa powder and pour in your instant coffee, sugar and creamer packs with a little water and stir it with the long spoon you get. Then you eat it out of the cocoa pouch and it gives you a caffeine rush that will help you stay awake or give you a boost of energy. It's not bad and a great use for some of the things you may not want (like my coffee and creamer). So if you get an MRE give it a try and see if it doesn't work for you too.Now I've said all of this to say that MREs are a great emergency food source or to put in your pack to go hiking, hunting, camping, etc...