1970s c rations and civ typle foods that you carryed in the field

[henry2]

i joined the army in the may of 1975 and was in germany later that year after boot camp and school ..my company commander had been in vietnam and he was a big fan of moveing fast and light without a lot of comfort items as called the military packs that we issused to us over there....

 

he belived in moveing and liveing out of the gi buttpack was better for field use than trying to hump a 50 to 60 pd alice pack when the russian where beathing down your neck and comeing across the line in waves of tanks and trooper carriers.....

 

plus in germany in the area of the line that we partoled we where going to be a speed bump for the russian army at the time....

 

he striped us down to the basic of everything ...the only thing that he did not mess was the carrying of civ typle food items..

 

for eating in the feild .we carried only a basic mess kit spoon and our canteen cup for drinking out of in the field along with the c-rations

 

that what they issused us for food in the field to eat..

 

we add civ typle personal food items that we bought at the px or grocery store..

 

in germany i found a super thick choc bar that looked like a ww.2 d-ration bar that could be broken down into pieces to be eat as need along with huge sugar cubes that came in a squared metal typle tin one cube was eough to sweeten the cup of tea that it was sweet sought style tea in our in canteen cups along with bitish syle tea bags in round metal tins and hot choc-and cool-aid drink powders to drink along with civ cans of foods that could be heated up quickly on a small backpacker typle stove that we all carried in our unit..

 

we took the c-rations out of the box and put them togerther in a round cylinder shaped unit and taped them down for travel in the buttpack ..

 

that was the first thing he taught us to do was to take the rations and break them down for travel in the buttpack ..

 

how to heat the food up on the little stoves and eat them right out of the can ..

 

a lot of the other people in the outfit thought of him as a little off at times for his training of us was little crazy at time....

 

we where a military intelligence company we where allways doing partolng and ambush and other typles of basic 11b skills in the field along with our job ..

 

so did anyone else do that in the field..

[11b inf]

i was a 11b Infantryman from 1980-2000, and spent a total of 6 years in different parts of southern Germany...i agree thier are many nice food items in Germany that are not found here in the states this is how i found out about the Esbit stove and fuel...i still use and maintain my web gear and equipment,weapon etc.. to this day...also if you were Army you went thru basic training and advanced individual training(MOS school) not "boot camp" thats for Navy and Marines....if your company commander came from a Infantry back ground im sure he tried real hard to impart combat skills to a non-Infantry unit /troops..good for him..vince g. 11b inf...

[Franklin45]

we add civ typle personal food items that we bought at the px or grocery store..

 

in germany i found a super thick choc bar that looked like a ww.2 d-ration bar that could be broken down into pieces to be eat as need...

 

Was that chocolate bar anything like this?

 

 

The Ritter Sport Bar.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ritter_Sport

[henry2]

yeah and we carryed about three or four diff typles of the bars to eat ..

 

i trying to find my old pack out list for the buttpack..he give us a packing list of the items that we had to carry at all times in the buttpack for our use..

 

plus they had a hot choc drink powder that was really good on a cold german winter night out in the field..

[Salvage Sailor]

so did anyone else do that in the field..

 

The supplemental gedunk we carried:

 

Peanuts

Lifesavers

sardines

the powdered intenational coffees

Jerky

raisins

 

All good in the tropical heat or on the boats.

[henry2]

it funny how you look back at the way we did things and wonder if other units did the same thing..

 

but it was funny after i left germany and went back to the states and came back over at a later time

the company that i was assigned to was very by the book typle and did not fool around in areas that we could carry in the field..

[henry2]

iam sorry for the slip up for my dad and uncle where in the navy and marine corp and i still use term from them at time like deck and head in my speech from them ....

i did a lot of push ups in basic for calling the latine a head in the first part of basic training for i told my drill sergant that a toliet in the head was stoped up and overflowing ..

 

the funny thing was i meet up with my former drill sergant in germany at the px when shopping with his wife and kids ..i was just married and meeting him in a place outside basic training where i was getting yelled at and pushed around to get thing done ..for he never talked to us in a normal tone of voice for it was rasied up and shouting at us to do things at times.. did not seam to a such a bad guy after all.

 

he told he thought it was funny at times in basic that i used marine and navy word for items in the barracks for i had grow up with them call the items that .. and he told that the kids that came from military family background where lot easlyer to deal with at times .

 

plus most of the guys in my first company where former military from other branchs that gone back into the service ..

i had one guy that started in the army and then went to the air force and back into the army agian

i had a sergant that started out in the army tugboats and i thought it was funny at time when he would say something to a person when we where seting up radio jammer antennas and he say thing to a person or a group and i would have to tell them what he said ..at times..

 

i finshed my career path right after first gulf war and was in the reserves with guys all branchs of service so you still pick and use words from every one else service//

 

plus all my kids did not follow me into the army but in the air force and the navy

thank god for that small flavor....

[henry2]

the first day of barracks was funny for he told us to make out bunks and see if we knew how ..

i made my bunk up with the hospital corners and tight blanker he came by and looked at it did not say thing then walked down to the end of the back of the bunks and started rip them apart..

 

he tells good me but not good eought and rips it apart..as he tears my bed apart..

[DocRick]

I served 1979 to 1985 as an 8404 corpsman. Started off with C-rats. Cooked on heat tabs, boiling water, under the hood of a truck, Mutt or ambulance. Once, an M-60 gunner cooked off a belt of blanks about 2 feet from a stack of cans. Worked, but not too well. If time permitted (I was the last to turn in my steel pot for a kevlar) we would dump 5 or 6 cans of whatever into my helmet, along with gravy mix, some Ramon noodles, hot sauce and whatever else we had and made "helmet stew". Great on a cold day, cooked over a small fire or a bunch of heat tabs. Later, came the Meals-Rejected-by-Everyone. Some parts were better, some worse. Missed the cans of "fresh" peaches, helmet stew was still popular.

 

Doc Rick

[henry2]

i did not care much for mres or meal rejected by everyone .... the things we add to the meals to make them more able to eat them in the field ..i do think that the british guys had better rations packs than us ..we traded back and forth with the british guys for there rations packs ..

[henry2]

did you have take the beef sliced with potatoes and something else we mixed togerther with hot sauce to make a beef mix that not bad with a couple of shots of hot sauce mixed in ..