Situation:

2-3 day patrol/reconn

Requirements:

Light weight
Eat on the move
Min. preparness
High nurtitional value
Locally Obtained (local stores)

Got MRE's amd canned goods covered, but looking for something new, or something I have overlooked.

Reaper

Beef jerky, Pringles, nuts, granola bars, sunflower seeds,PB and crackers snack packs,freeze dried fruit, backpacking foods, spam, of course, M%M's, gatorade in spare canteen

Manchurian noodles, 10 cents a package, seal in ziplocks... although they do need to be prepared.

Also, if you can do some planning... get a 8 or 12 oz. wide mouth sealable plastic container for liquids and put dried goods in it with proper amount of water, probaly prepare it after breakfast and it will be pre- hydrated by lunch, heat alittle if you want and ready to go...

You would need to pack dried goods for this like dried beans, rice, blackeyed peas, you know what I mean... all pretty cheap at the local grocery store...

GORP, trail mix, First Strike Rations (the army all ready solved this problem / question) PB and J sandwiches, lunchables, smuckers un crustables, oh and those cereal bars with the layer of milky stuff

Protein shakes. You don't need milk. It doesn't taste the greatest, but they will give you everything you need. Until you add the water, the powder is almost weightless compared to canned or bagged foods.

I would not use this to fully replace food. However, it is not a bad "fast food" option or breakfast option. Also, the best if aroma of cooked foods will give away your location.

Go to the fitness and vitamin stores, or the fitness and vitamin section of your grocery story or wally world for the solutions.

I guess it depends a little on your weight profile going in, but if you are slightly overweight (ahem), then you can go a few days on the energy bars and protein drinks. EAS makes some pretty good protein shake type drinks that come in a soft "can" of sorts.

One issue with making a meal out of nuts and beef jerkey is that you get overloaded on salt, which in turn means you have to drink and overload of water, and then in turn can interfere with what you are doing when you need to urinate more often.

There are also some MRE entre equivalents available at a lot of places now. I know Safeway on the west coast carries them in the Italian food section. Cheese and salami can go for a couple days without refrigeration.

Not sure how many people here have really cooked with beans very much, but they take waaay to long to prepare for field use where you are trying to maximize your training time vs the time you are "out there". Likewise, I don't want to be taking hours out of a mission to sit and cook food in a fixed location that can compromise a mission. Beans are more of a retreat ration food than a field/operations ration food. Also, they can mess up your intestinal tract if they are not cooked long enough. The safest way to eat beans is to cook them for a very long time and then mash them. In theory this can be done in camp, but not on the trail in the bush.

Also, I dump and replace half the stuff out of my MREs anyway. I think those things end up being around 1/3 garbage that you have to hump. We used to call it "field stripping" the MREs.

Another excellent thing are the Power gel packs and the knockoffs. 5 hour energy min-bottle drinks. That sort of stuff.

Pemmican and Hard Tack are my two favorites. The easiest is Hard Tack. If you make it right, it won't be TOO hard to just munch outright. The good thing about hard tack is salt. You need to replace it when you sweat a lot, so add a tad more than 6 pinches to the recipe, or use sea salt.

Local grocery store has several items that will meet your requirements.

Tyson now offers white chicken breasts in a foil pack. 2-3 year shelf life and no refrigeration required. They also offer strips of cooked bacon this way.

I've seen other companies that offer ham in the same kind of pouch.

John Morrell has the bacon bits for salads that can also be added to gorp.

Jiff used to offer peanut butter in tubes like the old tootsie rolls.

Snack pack puddings and also their fruit cups.

All three major instant rice companies (Rice-a-roni, Uncle Benn's, Zaver whatever) all have meals that are ready in 90 seconds in a microwave. A pot of boiling water does the same thing.

Energy bars, nuts, gorp and dried fruis should be available at your local grocery store.

Go Wally World's pharmacy section and inthe health/fitness section you will find CLIF bars and MOJO (by same company.

+1 on the Clif Bars. They taste good and will give you a little energy to boot. pofb, good thinking on the protein powder, that's an awesome idea I've never really thought of in that capacity. You can get muscle milk, and one serving in a bottle of water will leave you full!

Thanks 7.62x39 militiaman. I would suggest that you buy those non refrigerated milk "juice packs" if you are planning on using milk. That way you can have them anytime without the worry of spoiled milk. Is Muscle Milk the same way? Do you have to keep it refrigerated?

My father and I used to this when we hiked sections of the Appalachian Trial. Powder plus milk pack...all you need until lunchtime.

Plus you can mix the powder into anything you can think of: coffee, your own energy bars, etc.

muscle milk can be bought as a powder and added to water. It tastes surprisingly well!

Have to try that out. Thanks

Some of the things I like to eat on the go or if I cant heat it.

Peanut Butter
Crackers/pretzels
Pouches of tuna or salmon
Jerky
Summer Sausage
Dried fruit
Nuts
Granola bars

You can get muscle milk, and one serving in a bottle of water will leave you full!

Doesn't meet the requirement of locally obtained, but how about Coast Guard rations? They are advertised as being a 3-day's supply of food, but I'm sure that is based on sitting in a life boat and not the high activity level required for patrolling. Still they are reasonably priced with a 5-year shelf life and 100% of the recommended vitamins and minerals.

3600 Calorie ER Food Bar

If your plan is to just survive while expending little to no energy at all (like sitting in a life raft waiting to be rescued) then those rations are just barely adequate (barely).

They don't have any protein in them, at all. They don't have any fats, at all (there are essential fatty acids, just like essential vitamins). They provide little energy.

About the only thing worse than those is the so-called food tablets that are floating around. They don't even provide the carbohydrate energy that the lifeboat rations do.

A regular solider in combat (in temperate climates) REQUIRES over 3000 Calories of energy a day. A soldier actively patrolling, in cold climates, or under a great deal of stress can require twice that amount, or more.

thats why im getting fat now while i can.. that way i can use it later..kinda like a camel*G*

I have been making homemade MREs before going on hikes or into the woods. I can put what I want into them, and pack as much or as little as I want. If you use the vacuum bags, etc. they can be completely water tight too.
Anyway, here is a youtube video that is kind of a tutorial. Remember, this is just a basic video, you can add or delete items as you want, and if you are like me, once the brain gets spinning, you will come up with all kinds of ideas on how to improve these. (I half cook pasta, the vacuum seal it and finish cooking it in the field and add some ragu..this is for camping, not just field hikes) but anywho, you get what I mean
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SzcLGzFxuTA&feature=related

Read the Gear section on the blue top bar. Make modifications where nessacerry, nothing will ever suit every one, kinda like politics.

Canned Sardines & Ritz Crackers or hardtack. Bacon bits & Pickled eggs. Get use to these dishes ahead of time.

Avoid heavy cheese before and on a march.

LS1

Doc, what do you suggest that is small, easy to load up onto our gear, and will give us what we need?

Im having a hard time finding anything that is leveled out, small, and cheap, and comes in bulk.

look at the various tuna, and chicken that is in the foil pouches. also there is uncle bens rice that is in a microwave pouch that can be heated in boiling water or with mre heaters. also spam is out in the foil pouch.

also some of these items would be good to make up your own mre style meals.

16oz Drink Packets, Bullion Cubes, Crackers, Dried Fruits, Emergency Food Bars, Freeze Dried Foods, Granola Bars, Hard Candy, Instant Coffee, Instant Soup, Jelly, Jerkey, MRE's, Nuts, Oatmeal, Peanut Butter, Pepper Packets, Power Bars, Salt Packets, Sugar Packets, Tea, Trail Mix

Yeah, what he said.

Very good selections in the above posts, also keep in mind things like...

Packets of Jello.
Small bags of rice and barley,(carried like a bean-bag, can also be used as a rifle butt-sock, you long range shooters should know what I mean).
Coast Guard Emergency Sea Rations,(packed like hard cakes for near a weeks worth, good nutritional value).
Instant coffee in a small zip-lock bag,(add packets of bees honey and/or sugar with non-dairy creamer, if you wish).
Energy bars for long distance hiking works well also.

Michael

According to calorielab.com, a full on burger king whopper meal with large fries and a drink is going to come in right around that 2500 calories. If someone says that a soldier with low bodyfat to begin with can operate for a full day on 300 calories without drastically reduced performance, they are just plain ignorant, or worse, lying.

Running 15 minutes cross country is going to burn 900. You can see how any serious physical activity is going to use up those ration foods in a hurry.

Think about your average farm worker or construction laborer. When I worked construction it was like this:

Breakfast burrito at 5:30 AM with coffee and some sort of bread item.

8 AM: Powerbar

10:30 Roughly 2 lbs of something off the canteen truck. If it was the Korean truck then some big plate of some pasta oriental stuff, if it was the Mexican truck it would be one of their monster burritos.

Noonish: Another power bar

2 PM, another power bar

3PM, a stop at a fast food joint on the way home.

8 PM, another dinner.

And with that sort of diet, I was barely maintaining a weight of 220.

Thing is, you can do a two or three day mission on more limited food, and then there is the whole issue of pack space and weight. Powerbars and protein bars are a biggie, same with the trail mix stuff. You can get pretty big bags of tail mix at walmart for $5 per bag.

The meat snack beef jerkey type stuff can be a problem since it is usually unusually high in salt. That's why a lot of distance runners shy away from it. The stuff works well as a treat, and as an added ingredient in some sort of camp stew, but chowing down on it for the bulk of your calories is going to be a problem.

The average Americam can live off of his own body fat for a full week.

Three days?

EmergenC
Sesame Crackers (Calcium)
Water

and im curious what does one do with all the trash that comes with prepackaged foods that your carrying? burry it? burn it take it home maybe..that works for training since you go back to your life after FTX..but if SHTF you cant always take it home and i guess it doesnt really matter with all the other debris that will be around..

Save it and use it later.

"save it and use it later" like for TP maybe??????

Average!? Cool, that means I am good for about two weeks.

Take along lg ziplock type baggies and stow all trash in one. carry these in you bdu trouser pockets. When able to get to either a trash can or dumpster, toss it in.

uncooked ramen noodles and peanut butter are pretty good on-the-move food. When I was hitchhiking around the country it was a staple. That and beef jerkey saved my life because they were light and high nutrition.

and when all else fails, methamphetamines and multivitamins can keep you going for about three weeks. (sorry, had to inject some humor)

Well I made ration bars out of oats, choclate chips, nuts, peanut butter & pan cake syrup. all you need is a dehydrater or a few munites in an oven & you good. cheaper then cliff bars to.

Well I made ration bars out of oats, choclate chips, nuts, peanut butter & pan cake syrup. all you need is a dehydrater or a few munites in an oven & you good. cheaper then cliff bars to.

Sir, can you enlighten us with your recipe?

Try Googling Johnny cakes or Pemmican. You might also try Primitive Skills, Pioneering skills.

An Outdoors Skills instructor from wayyyy back name of Larry Dean Olsen out of Utah probably has something in one of his books. Fashioning knives, spears and fish hooks from flint and bone.

There is a cracker of sorts called 'Pilot Bread'. It is about 1/2" thick x 4" round. Ninety eight percent of finished product is destined for Alaska as it is a staple up there. It comes in a large blue box about 5 1/2-6" square x 16-18" long. It is manufactured by just one facility in the lower 48. I have seen Pilot Bread in the bulk foods department at Winco Foods in western WA state. The bulk pricing is MUCH more REASONABLE than the box price unless you don't mind paying $16 for a cool blue box full of huge crackers.
Stripped MREs like the fruit/gorilla cookies/crackers and jam-cheese-peanut butter, Gorp, kippered snacks, processed cheese or jam, quart sized kool-aid/ gatorade/ Tang this sort of thing are products I have used to good effect. MRE bread (if you can find it) could be made into a quick sandwich with what have you.

In days of yore when I'd been out for 8 days w/o resupply and we stopped to eat I was mighty glad to have anything to eat. Three of us were down to kippered snacks on Rye Krisp crackers w/peanut butter washed down w/Wylers drink mix and 1 orange to share amongst us. It was a feast.

By just using your common sense you don't have to spend an arm and a leg to score patrol rations. Check your kitchen first. Those small portion snap top cans of /skettii/mac 'n beef/mac 'n cheese etc at regular (big) grocery stores are by and large a WAY BETTER DEAL than same item at ANY convenience store. Watch the ads for sales and get these items at reduced prices and start a nestegg of 'patrol rations' ONLY to draw from when preparing to move out.
That's the way I roll.

my field rations for 72 hr pack is a small pouch of rice, 6 energy bars and 2 of them 5 hr energy drinks and 1 canteen of water, weight is little over 2bls for 3 days. doesn't keep me full but will keep me going. i also have a small tin that weighs less then 3ozs that i keep a few bullion cubes and some fishing line with hooks small lures, snare line and water purifier tablets.

Engergy bars and the gel packs, the Amway people have an alternative to the gel pack which they make low carb and low sugar with creatine as the main ingredient. It works well. It is super efficient, made for runners to carry in a small pocket of their shorts or even in a sock like the Powergel.

A few cans of energy drinks, then a bottle or two of water. My kits will include an EMPTY 2 qt canteen which gets filled at some point during the exercise, the two small commercially packaged water bottles are supposed to last until then. The reason being that I noticed keeping filled canteens in a bugout kit causes more problems than it is worth with water going stale and whatnot.

Absolutely nothing that requires cooking or preparation in any way, shape or form.

A single large $5 bag of trail mix can easily last a day or two of moderate munching.

A real strategy is to run a high enough level of bodyfat that it does not tax your performance, but also makes it no big deal if you skip a couple of meals.

You feast a full day before the patrol, eat light the night before, light the morning of the op, then make sure you crap out what can be crapped out before actually heading out. Don't eat big on an op because that means you will have to make potty stops somewhere along the way, and the timing for that can turn out really really bad.

If you do have to eat, stick to sterilized packaged food which will not put you at risk of getting you sick. Another reason to avoid having anything to do with food that needs to be prepared on an op is the whole issue of pots, pans, cleaning dishes ect...

Camp food and the after-op feast, sure that ought to be prepared food, but not on the op. That is stuff for the retreat, cache, vehicle heavy baggage maybe, but not your go-pack.

I would say you're either in TOP PHYSICAL CONDITION or bullshyting us. That's just my .02 and I'm not trying to stir up trouble or call you a you-know-what.

I liked Breachers post of a heavy/filling meal the day before. A light meal the night b4, a light breakfast the morning of along with taking a big #2 b4 you step off. Eat and drink litely as possible during OP or FTX to minimise potty stops.

Anytime I can go camping for 3 days or so or an OP or FTX and NOT have to take a #2 the entire time I'm out is a real good deal 4 me.

Thanks noname762.

Something else I just noticed in re-reading my post, although it is a four day plan, it is a 48 hours in the op/field condition plan fine tuned for those of us for work during the week and would be doing training and whatnot on long weekends.

Additional food for the feast meal is generally not something you carry on your back, it is at your main camp, safehouse, vehicles or the commercial establishments you will eat at (and no, I am not above stopping at a restaurant in the middle of an op.) If you are living really primitive, it is the stuff you stripped out of your MREs combine with maybe a game animal or fish you got out in the boonies.

A couple more issues involve the possible upsetting of your sleep schedule.

There are some pretty good instant coffees out there now that come in really compact packages and help work as a stimulant. Bad news, they often act as a laxative too. (back to the idea of not having a big meal still in your system while on the patrol). Coffee is definitely a must have on that day one morning before you head out where there are no more restrooms.

Another issue is to force sleep when it is possible, perhaps controversial with some here, but a small bottle of high octane drinkable alcohol. Not for when you are needing to make any important decisions, but when you want to numb things a bit and beat down the jitters so you can rest.

On field ops with my old unit, I limited people to one shot each. Right after a long hard "day" of running and gunning, and or work, a shot before turning in seemed to be a major morale booster and got people sleeping like babies right off the bat. That is especially the case if they have been running on caffeine and energy stuff for a while.

There is something definitely relaxing and de-stressing about that moment you break out the bottle for the team when you are all covered with an inch or so of cold ass mud in the back of an APC, dark, tired as hell, the smell of diesel and sweat permeating the air. Moving your feet every few moments to keep them from freezing into the mud on the floor of the track, and then it's time to pass the bottle. None of that "miller time back at the base", nope, we're hitting it right here so the ride back does not seem so damn long and dark. That's when the troop bitching drops to zero, the pride starts to sink in and the look on your boy's faces is "yeah, we got this handled".

SBL,

Bear in mind I am not for following cooking directions. So I'm generaling a bit & its not exact, so you have room to wiggle with the recipy. Each part by wieght so...

1 part peanut butter
3 to 4 parts pancake syrup: larger part for thicker syrup
1 part crushed nuts
1 part chocolate chips

mix into a creamy "whipped" consistancy & add 3 parts uncooked oats & form into 3" x 3" blocks about a 2" in thickness. dehydrate for approx 8 to 12 hours or heat at 450 in an oven for 5 minutes & let set & repeat as needed.

Makes 9 to 10 parts; say 10lbs, 10 oz. or even a single pound made from parts 1/10th of pound. Keep them in zip lock bags or vacum bags. 2 blocks for breakfast, 1 at lunch & 1 for dinner during high activity & 1 per meal during low activity. For say 3 to 4 days it'd be 10 to 12 oz of wieght.

SBL,

Bear in mind I am not for following cooking directions. So I'm generaling a bit & its not exact, so you have room to wiggle with the recipy. Each part by wieght so...

1 part peanut butter
3 to 4 parts pancake syrup: larger part for thicker syrup
1 part crushed nuts
1 part chocolate chips

mix into a creamy "whipped" consistancy & add 3 parts uncooked oats & form into 3" x 3" blocks about a 2" in thickness. dehydrate for approx 8 to 12 hours or heat at 450 in an oven for 5 minutes & let set & repeat as needed. Optionally, add shredded jerky 1 part to the mix.

Makes 9 to 10 parts; say 10lbs, 10 oz. or even a single pound made from parts 1/10th of pound. Keep them in zip lock bags or vacum bags. 2 blocks for breakfast, 1 at lunch & 1 for dinner during high activity & 1 per meal during low activity. For say 3 to 4 days it'd be 10 to 12 oz of wieght.