WW II "mre"s

“Just interviewed a WW II vet early this AM for a Vet's Day story.

He was at Normandy, although not in the first troops. Great guy with great stories...

Anyway, he showed me actual food packages they had in WW II. They were in cardboard boxes. Something like (don't have notes in front of me):
- 4 crackers
- 2 lumps of sugar
- 2 cigarettes
- brownish toilet paper (so if they left it behind in pre "LNT" Days, they wouldn't get bullet-riddled by the enemy)
- chocolate
- dried fruit bar

Breakfast and dinner were similar. NOTHING WARM!

The guy said he went into the service at 190 and came out at 160 pounds.”

“I believe they had cans of food included.
They called them C-rations.


I've become quite the expert on modern Meals Ready To Eat. Been eating a lot of them since the hurricane. Had one for lunch today. ;-)
last edited: 11/04/05 2:09:30 PM”

“Those were K-rations lizs, packaged for field use. http://www.marauder.org/krations.htm”

“OK, I bet he did say somehow he lost the can that went with it.

I do know that either during WW I or WW II, Hormel basically started Spam. The "Spam Museum " in Austin has all kinds of exhibits on its use during the war.”

“Spam did start in WW II. Yes, K-rats came in cans. The website shows how these were packaged. They also contained cigarettes and books of waterproof matches.”

“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C-ration

C-ration
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
Meal, Combat Individual (C-ration) was the name of field rations issued by the United States of America from World War II to the 1980s. Each ration consisted of a canned entree, a "B2 unit" containing cheese, crackers and candy, a canned dessert, and an accessory pack. The accessory pack contained a P-38 can opener, mix for a hot beverage, salt and sugar packets, plastic spoon, chewing gum, a pack of four cigarettes and several sheets of toilet paper. Each complete meal provided approximately 1200 calories (1200 kcal or 5000 kJ).

Due to health concerns, cigarettes were eliminated from the packages in 1975. C-rations were phased out in favor of the MRE beginning in 1983.”

“Dad use to serve us K-rations when I was a kid. I think the K stands for Korea.”