U.S. ARMY WANTS YOU – TO EAT MRE'S AS AN EXPERIMENT

The U.S. Army Institute of Environmental Medicine is looking for volunteers to eat military food rations for 21 consecutive days for a study of the impact of Meals, Ready-to-Eat, or MREs, on soldiers’ health. Researchers want to learn how MREs influence the millions of bacteria in troops’ digestive systems. “Interactions between the millions of bacteria living in our gut and what we eat is a very important factor in gut health, but we don’t know how MRE foods interact with those bacteria to impact gut health,” said Holly McClung, a research dietitian working to improve the tastiness of the food. One of the main obstacles is finding people willing to commit to a steady diet of ready-to-eat meals. MREs must meet a wide battery of requirements to guarantee shelf life and meet strict nutritional benchmarks.
– MREs must be capable of withstanding parachute drops from 1,250 feet
– The packaging is required to maintain a minimum shelf life of 3 1/2 years at 80 degrees Fahrenheit or nine months at 100 degrees.
Some of the meals test participants will be asked to eat include creations like parachute pork, battalion brownie pops or Ranger red hot party mix.
* I don’t like the sound of this. They have an entire army of soldiers who could test this food for them, but they want US to do it.
* They’re working to improve the tastiness of the food? Good luck with that.
* They have to keep 3 1/2 years at 80 degrees? Seriously, 7-Eleven figured this out for their hot dogs years ago.
* Here are some other military-themed meals they missed:
– Reveille ravioli
– Grenade granola
– Troop soup
– Latrine beans
– Bivouc-amole
– Torpedo tubers
* I don’t know. I bet if you eat the MRE’s for too long you’ll be MIA.
* You’ll also be SOL.
* The MREs can take a parachute drop of 1,250 – in fact it helps to stun them into submission.
* How powerful are these MREs? One group of MREs took an entire battalion prisoner.
* They’ll only last 3 and a half years? What if the war takes longer than that?