"MRE" AKA "Meals Rarely Enjoyed" ...

hmm a weird and most interesting subject...MRE's who's weird enough to write about it let alone actually eat one??? well you found such weirdo...
After being married to a ex-soldier (He got out this past year, honorable discharge and all yipeeeeee!!!) for a couple of years you end up finding (strange to you normal to me) things laying around..for instance a bulletproof vest...(although that might come in handy when DS's are teenagers)...a 9Ibs kevlar helmet...a couple of knives and of course the pantry stocked with...yes boxes of MRE's each containing 12 complete meals  yummmm...NOT!!! did I mention that my first date with DH was my first experience with these "rarely enjoyed meals"
anyways they are not all that bad and when you hit a good one you might en up with a bag of M&M's and the jalapeno cheese "monstrosity" (ooops did I just say that? I meant spread) DH loves it...yuck!!!
anyways they are amazing when you are camping (or in our case to tired to cook...) and you want a good meal.
Now it's not that hard to figure out how to prepare it but some people in my family were fascinated by it and asked if I could put it in a blog...
I put together a tutorial on how to make and prepare an MRE (Oh Lord have mercy...snicker...snicker...)
you can buy these at the army surplus store but they cost ya an arm and a leg...
Ready? Set? so here goes nothing...

Here is some basic info on MRE courtesy of urban dictionary:

Military acronym originally meaning "Meal, Ready to Eat."

Modern MRE's generally consist of a main course, bread and spread (grape jelly, strawberry or blackberry jam, jalapeno cheese, etc.), a desert (pound cake, M&M's,), powdered drinks, a condiment package, and a heating element (in case the soldier is interested in a semi-hot meal). Each MRE, when fully consumed, is approximately 2000 calories, the suggested daily caloric per day for an average person.

The quality of MRE's has consistently improved, though when compared to other food, it is still disgusting This explains why MRE's have several derisive terms:

- Meals Rejected by Everyone
- Meals Rarely Enjoyed
- Meals Rejected by Ethiopians
- Meals Rejected by the Enemy
- Meals Refusing to Exit* (they say the gum in the package is a mild laxative lol)

There are methods of enjoying an MRE so that it's not particularly terrible. "The Ranger Cookbook" is an unofficial military document which provides the soldier an effective means of mixing and matching MRE's so as to have the most enjoyable meal possible.

so we start with the MRE package. You will notice I chose the cheese tortellini vegetarian (now a lot of people say they hate the vegetarian meals but this one is actually not that bad...) 

Ok once you chose your meal take the bag and look for the "peelable seal" when you find it open it up (DH said that when they were in training they had approx. 5 min to eat a meal...it took me 5min just to open the bag!!! I would starve in the army or just have to start liking cardboard lol)

Ok you got it open, good for you!!! by now (if you are me that is) you have lost about 5min lol. take the contents out of the bag.

YES!!! I was lucky I got a bag of M&M's (lol the only truly valuable thing in there really in my opinion!) anyways this is what was in mine, yours might vary so don't be too disappointed... top row: is the bag itself now empty, second row: your utensils, peanut butter, lemon aid mix, your staples:toilet paper, matches, gum, coffee, salt, sugar, creamer..., and crackers. bottom row: bag to mix your drink in, main meal, side dish, a nutrition/energy bar, and your heating element.

OK we're doing good we're doing good keep it up have a lot more gruesome steps to take ;-) this is the box containing your main course, this one happens to be cheese tortellini in tomato sauce. the info of the meal is written on the box although I wouldn't suggest you find out too much about it it might scare you!

As you see I opened the box...go... and do thoust likewise...

wow this is like a pass the package and take off the next layer...inside the box you will see a green pouch, this contains the food...I promise! take the pouch out of the box...KEEP THE BOX!!! we will use it later!

So now in your pile of food and condiments find the big green heating bag it looks like this...

On the top of the bag you will see "tear here to use bag"...as you guessed go ahead and...tear it

just in case you were lost and needed me to repeat ;-)

OK this is what it looks like open, inside there is a pack of little "rocks" or "crystals" (not quite sure what they are but they are cool you'll see)

Now take the food pouch and slide it into the heating bag, make sure the pack of crystal/rocks are under the pouch (sometimes you might have two parts to the main course, you can either choose to heat both in the heating bag, if you do this just know that both packs will turn out lukewarm or you can choose the one you want hot and just heat that one...it's up to you. in my opinion they should have added at least two heating bags in each MRE)

next we need some water (don't worry I filled this bottle with tap water lol)

On the bottom of the heating bag you will find this inscription: "DO NOT OVERFILL" so please do not pour water past that line. Just so you know, it really doesn't take a lot of water so pour it in slowly!

I don't know if you noticed but the crystal/rocks react very quickly and the package will start to smoke and get really hot really quickly so don't panic it's normal for it to smoke and steam! (I tried to get a picture of the smoke and stem but It didn't turn out to good)

next fold over the top (the bag will start to expand don't worry just work quickly cause it get's really hot to handle)

Put the folded heating bag into the original box the food pouch came from

Make sure the box is slightly elevated, I used the water bottle to elevate it. leave it there for a good 10min to 15min (so you can see the poor soldiers who had to eat their MRE's in 5 min...yuck, no wonder they got those names lol)

While you are waiting for your main course to heat, dig in to your other delicatessen mmmmm enjoy!

OK my bag also had a mixing bag for the drinks included in my case that would be either the lemonade or coffee. If I want to heat the water for coffee I would have to add it into the heating bag with the food pouch it would def. not be hot hot or you can choose to mix the lemonade in it. 1. Open the bag, fill with water to the appropriate fill line. add beverage powder 2. Remove air from bag, then secure closure 3. place beverage bag in heating bag as you did the food pouch.

Be careful only to heat the beverage for 4-6min NOT longer!

OK did you enjoy the rest of your MRE? what, the crackers were too dry? really?wow your the first to say that lol  well it's about time to eat your main course ready?

The bag is hot so be careful!

take the torn off end and open it up

Carefully take the pouch out of the heating bag, be careful it's hot!

I usually keep the original MRE bag so I can put all the trash into it at the end, that way it's all cleaned up in the end

Knead the pouch to distribute the heat all around...be careful it was pretty hot might want to wear some kitchen gloves (alright military guys have your laugh!)

find the little tabs on either side

And open it up, if you notice you will see additional tabs under the first ones, once you start eating your meal you can continue tearing them to make it easier to reach your food

Yum enjoy lol

 Well that's all folks! hope it helped...