This holiday season, somewhere around the world, there are American troops who are in positions where they might not be able to have a Christmas dinner (or the dinner for whatever holiday they might celebrate). They will be stuck where they are, probably having to eat a meal, ready-to-eat (MRE). We wanted to see if this is something edible and pleasing, so we got one to try!

One of the companies that makes the MREs for soldiers also makes a version for civilian consumption (apparently selling military MREs is not a thing they can do). I found several cases of MREs, and then stumbled upon a single MRE to buy. So I ordered it, and today we sampled a soldier's meal.

We got the Chili and Macaroni meal, and it comes with a lot of things:

  • Spoon
  • Vegetable crackers
  • Peanut butter
  • Cheese spread
  • Oatmeal cookie
  • Lemon-lime drink
  • Chili Macaroni entree
  • Chemical entree heating bag

The cracker seemed to be oddly fragile, and kept breaking every time we touched it, but was fine. It was good with the peanut butter or the cheese spread on it, though! The cheese spread might smell like death, but actually tastes pretty good.

The cookie was decent, large, and had a lot of spice in it, almost like a pumpkin pie in an oatmeal cookie.

The lemon-lime drink was like a less sweet Kool-Aid drink, even if it looks like a glass of Slimer from Ghostbusters.

I totally failed at cooking the entree with the heat bang thing...for some reason it didn't even get hot until we removed the entree bag from the heat bag. So I had to dump out the food and microwave it. The chili and macaroni was still good, though, and was like a good canned pasta meal you can get in the grocery store.

All in all, while it's not even close to a home-made turkey dinner with all the sides, and having family around, at least we know our soldiers are eating decent food out in the field! I've had so many troubles finding a turkey dinner MRE, but we would have tried that one if it existed.

Now that we've experienced a bit of a deployed soldier's dining experience, we have to thank all our service men and women for all they do for us! They sacrifice and do a lot to keep us safe, including eating meals from plastic bags. Thank you!

We hope all of you have a great Christmas, or whichever holiday you celebrate!

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