2007 Menu: Meatloaf with Gravy

Meatloaf with Gravy Review By Todd Farino

I've had the Meatloaf with Gravy several times and before I wrote this review I had to have it one more time. I will admit that regardless of how good MREs are, there are some bad ones and some very bad ones. Meatloaf with Gravy is a very bad one. Its one of those MREs where the MRE itself is far better then the entree.

Let's start with its look. The eyes are critical as one of the five senses that determine taste and guess what, it looks gross. Its a big brown gooey square chunk of what I suspect is meat. So from the start you aren't liking the meal or happy with it. Many MREs look better then they taste, and that is a fact. You will spend the next 1-3 minutes smashing it up and put the entire bottle of Tabasco Sauce in with at least half of the packet of salt. That will help mask the chewy texture and the bland almost Nil taste. Only the weak almost fading taste of onion is really present. If you haven't noticed I don't like the taste of the Meatloaf, nor do I like the look of. It was an all-around bad experience and not one I could wish on anyone. So, unless you like to eat a chewy block of god knows what with a scent of onion, then the meatloaf with gravy is for you.

The side you get is mashed potatoes and you can mix them into the meatloaf. However, the potatoes are not very good and are frankly chunky, bland, and in some parts hard. I through the potatoes out after a few bites. That's how bad those were.

The rest of the MRE isn't bad. You get crackers and apple jelly, which make a nice appetizer. That tastes very good, and I love the apple jelly. It is our favorite jelly in the MREs. It also comes with an Oatmeal cookie, which also is our favorite cookie in the MREs, and adds a perfect touch of taste after the bland meatloaf. It also came with Skittles, but can come with an assortment of candies. I have to say avoid this MRE if you can, but it may meet the tastes of some MRE eaters, but not this one.

OVERALL RATING:

2007 Menu: Cheese Tortellini

The MRE Cheese Tortellini is a perfect entree for vegetarians and meat eaters alike. It is comprised of stuffed tortellini shells filled with cheese tossed in a tasty tomato sauce. The shells are perfectly preserved and are soft without being mushy. The sauce carries quite a bit of flavor and a hint of garlic. To add more flavor I added salt and Tabasco sauce which gave it a spicy kick and brought out the flavors. I recommend not mushing the contents in the pouch as regular MRE's but instead just stir in the salt and sauce until all is covered since they're are bit seize pieces and easily mixed.

The Spiced Apples side dish added more taste and a great mix to the meal. Though the spiced apples could have used more spice. The MRE also came with crackers, peanut butter, and a HooAH! Bar. I have to say I wasn't pleased with the peanut butter or the HooAH! Bar. However, I did get some cheese spread from my Husband's Spaghetti MRE and it was divine!

Personally, this is one of my favorite all time MRE. It gets 5 stars from me !

OVERALL RATING:

MRE Review: Cheese Spread and Wheat Snack Bread

Cheese Spread and Wheat Snack Bread By Todd Farino

I have to admit when I decided to try the cheese spread I was skeptical. I haven't eaten the spread since 1996 after I had a bad experience with it. However, my wife asked me to try it and I did with one of my personal favorite MRE contents, Wheat Snack Bread. Let me just say it was pretty good. The bread was dry as we expect with MRE breads, but not as dry as you would expect. The cheese spread certainly performed its job of not only moistening the bread, but also giving it a very rich cheese flavor. I have to say they were a perfect match. The wheat bread without a doubt is a softer and more flavorful eat then the crackers, so I would recommend the wheat bread over the crackers.

Also, the cheese spread was easy to spread on with the MRE spoon and made little mess. The only negatives were the dry bread and the lack of overall flavor. There was flavor from the cheese spread as expected, but it wasn't overwhelming and the bread provided more of a holder of the cheese. Otherwise, the cheese didn't bring out the breads natural flavor. We recommend spreading salt on the cheese for more flavor.

Overall, I give this combo a thumbs up and say if you get the cheese spread and wheat snack bread you will be very happy.

OVERALL RATING:

MRE Review: Cheese Spread

Cheese Spreads By Michelle Farino



The Cheese spread that is packagecd in MRE's come in 3 flavors; cheddar cheese spread, jalapheno cheese spread, and cheese spread with bacon. Accompayning the cheese spread is wheat bread, crackers, or vegetable crackers varying from menu to menu. It tastes great with the crackers provided, but admittingly not as tastey when applied to the wheat bread. I use the spoon provided to spread the cheese around the cracker. I find the cheese spread a perfect appetizer before the main menu.

Jalapheno cheese spread: This is my personal favorite of the 3. It has just the right amount of spice to it, it has kick but is not overwhelmingly hot. I prefer to use it on the plain crackers versus the vegetable crackers.

Cheddar cheese spread: This spread goes great with any of the crackers and bread provided. The texture is soft without being runny or gooey.

Cheddar spread with bacon: This spread has small bits of bacon in it and well as a bacon flavor added to the cheese. If your a bacon lover or a meat eater you'll enjoy it. For vegetarians it's such a small amount of bacon that you can pick it out. It goes the best with the plain crackers but also tastes good with the vegetable crackers.

MRE Review: Cinnamon Scone

Cinnamon Scone Review By Todd Farino


From the name it sounds delicious. That is of course if you know what a Scone is. Here is the actual definition of a Scone

scone  /skoʊn, skɒn/ –noun
1. A small, light, biscuit-like quick bread made of oatmeal, wheat flour, barley meal, or the like.

Obviously, the one you are getting in MREs has an added ingredient of the greatest sweet spice on the earth cinnamon. As you can tell I love cinnamon, so I was excited to try this treat the first time I had a chance. It isn't the most common snack bread dessert or treat you will fine, but you will get it. I have to admit that I wasn't happy at all with its taste and for three reasons.

1. semi-hard bread. The scone is moist, but it is one of the least moist snack breads in MREs and was a tad hard. Right off the bat the psyches a person out when getting ready to enjoy there dessert. "OH look, the bread seems stale.

2. Very dry. The Cinnamon Scone is the driest bread treat to date in MREs. It quietly reminds me of the Las Vegas Valley dry desert weather. It is a meal that requires milk, water, or just something to help you swallow it.

3. Where is the Cinnamon? Was the name given to fool us? Was a trick name meaning apposite of cinnamon. As far as I can tell, the taste of Cinnamon is barely there. You do taste sugar, but cinnamon just doesn't ring a bell in my taste buds when I was eating this morsel.

Overall, its just a bad treat. If your lucky and you get a moist one, celebrate. It still has a sweet taste, but that is about it.

Overall Rating:

2008 Menu: Spaghetti w/ Meat Sauce

Spaghetti w/ Meat Sauce Review By Todd Farino

First off I want to state that I've had both the 2007 and 2008 Spaghetti w/ Meat Sauce MRes and I see no difference with their quality. This review will cover both meals and be repeated for the 2007 version as well. Spaghetti w/ Meat Sauce is one of 7 Italian MRES from the 2008 set of menus. It is not the best, but its close. It is menu #20 from both the 2007 & 2008 Menus. Here's what I thought of it.

The Entree of Spaghetti w/ Meat Sauce was fabulous. For the standards of an MRE it was nearly perfect Spaghetti. The key to edible spaghetti is that the pasta is not chewy. It completely ruins the taste and joy of eating spaghetti. The MRE makers cooked the spaghetti just perfect, so its not chewy , but it is a little extra moist. Moist spaghetti in an MRE will cause it to clump up a bit, but the can be remedied by removing it from the pouch or mixing it in the pouch well. If there is a weakness to this entree its the taste of the meat. Its pretty regular, but overall not impressive. It is saved with the sauce flavoring, but could certainly use more garlic. If you happen to know you will have the spaghetti MRE, bring a bottle of garlic salt, you will thank yourself. Of course, like all meals they do require spicing up and if you don't have garlic with you, never fear Tabasco sauce comes in the MRE to save the day. Pour 3/4 to a full bottle into the spaghetti pouch and mix with about half of the salt packet. Mix it will and you will have very good and spicy spaghetti w/ meat sauce. If you are lucky to have the Garlic, add it as well for a perfect meal. Like all MREs, this is necessary to overpower that classic MRE pouch flavor that is given to all MRE foods. Also, always mix the entree very well. YOu want to break up the meat sauce and mix it well.


The gist of this rather tasty MRE is getting past the meat. I'm not a big fan of most beef products in MREs, but the meat sauce is one of the better beef products. Probably because it well separated and mixed in the sauce.



The rest of the MRE was pretty good. It came with Wheat Snack bread and cheese spread, which was good, but the big kicker was the Cherry Blueberry Cobbler. We will review that in a few days. Even the Electrolyte (Gatorade) was worth drinking. With sugar of course!



Overall Rating:

MRE Review: Vanilla Dairy Shake

This review is by Badtux the Disaster Chef Penguin posted at Badtux the Snarky Penguin. It was written on 3/08/2006.


I *finally* dared the MRE Vanilla Dairy Shake of Death for lunch today.
Verdict: Flawed, but still good.
There are two basic problems:
1) when made with cold water, it turns out pretty lumpy.
2) It's hard to tear open the package without tearing it too far and making it hard to, well, shake (!). So if I had to do it again, I'd open the packet using the scissors on my Leatherman Juice (which goes everywhere with me when I'm in the field... the one I have is the perfect size, big enough to be useful but small enough that I don't feel like I'm carrying a big lump of iron in my pocket).
Still, once you get that all squared away, it tastes fine. Not like a chemical spill, which apparently is what the strawberry or chocolate versions taste like. So it turns out that all the fear and trembling was for nothing. I'd have no problem at all with drinking this thing while in the field.

2004 Menu: Jambalaya

This review is by Badtux the Disaster Chef Penguin posted at Badtux the Snarky Penguin. It was written on 3/26/2007.

This is off the 2004 menu, thus why I am eating it (taste and nutrition of MRE's goes downhill after 3 years).
Entree': Jambalaya. This had nice chunks of high-quality ham and shrimp in it. I added in the little bottom of Tabasco and ate it with the MRE crackers and it was quite tasty.
An aside on MRE crackers: These are one of the wonders of the universe. How the wizards of Natick could manage to make a cracker that will survive anything short of a nuclear blast without becoming crumbles is one of those testaments to old-fashioned American know-how that are rare nowadays. They aren't the tastiest crackers around -- they have to be sort of heavy and dense to both a) provide calories to meet MRE calorie requirements and b) be able to survive being dropped 50 feet from a hovering helicopter -- but they are definitely edible and tasty enough after you've been slogging for miles with a pack on your back and are hungry enough to eat a horse, hooves and all.
MRE Bread and Jalapeno Cheese spread -- I've mentioned MRE bread before, which is more a soft dense wheat cookie than anything that you might think of as "bread" due to shelf life and durability requirements. But this makes a nice little meal all in and of itself. Just knead the cheese spread tube until it's soft, snip open the end with the scissors on your pocket knife (note: If you do not have a pocket knife with scissors in it, *get one*, very very handy!), squirt out on "bread", enjoy!
Pound cake: This is good in and of itself. Soft, moist (if a bit dense), little pieces of carrot and fruit. But if you had one of those MRE meals like Menu 16 (Chicken w/Noodles) that inexplicably included peanut butter despite having nothing that would taste good with peanut butter on it, this is a good target for your leftover peanut butter.
Candy - just your commercial Skittles package.
In later years they deleted the candy, cheese spread and crackers and replaced them with the MRE Dairy Shake, which is quite good (albeit a bit lumpy even with a full two minutes of vigorous shaking). The MRE bread tastes okay in place of the crackers as something to eat with the Jambalaya, so I suppose it all works out, you still end up with basically two "meals" (the dairy shake vs. the bread+cheese, and the entree').
All in all, I have to rate this one a winner, whether it's the 2004 version or the later versions. Alas, it appears this one was discontinued for 2007 to make room for "Meatballs with Marinari". Whoa, sounds like the round balls of death circa 1993 the "four fingers of death" ("smoky frankfurters"). Definitely *not* a substitution that I think I'm going to enjoy, but (shrug). If you get dropped old stock for disaster relief, this is definitely one to keep rather than trade.

MRE Review: Pound Cakes

Pound Cakes Review By Todd Farino

Pound cakes come in a variety of flavors and are found in 7 Menus from the 2007-2008 cases. One of the fun parts of MREs is the ability to trade your contents. If there was one item I would always trade for is the pound cake. The most common flavor you will find is the Pineapple, but there are also Pumpkin. The pound cakes are outstanding from the 2007 and 2008 menus. They are kept very moist in the packages and taste very sweet. Like all breads in MREs they can taste a bit dry after you began chewing, but overall they are the best dessert item. They are packed with flavor and are an absolute joy to find in your MRE and eat them. Never trade your pound cake, always eat them with a smile.

Overall Rating:

2007 Menu: Vegetable Manicotti

Vegetable Manicotti By Michelle Farino

Entree Taste: The vegetable Manicotti is an excellent MRE entree, especially for those who are vegetarian. This is one of my favorite MRE entree's. I like to spice it up a bit with Tabasco, which is provided, and seasoning it with salt to give it extra flavor. When eating directly from the poach I find that it's easier to eat with you cut it up into small pieces. It does has great flavor for an MRE meal and makes for a fantastic meal when spiced up.

Side Taste: The paspberry applesauce was quite frankly apple sauce. You'll enjoy it if you enjoy regular apple sauce as it is an acquired taste. It was decent for being a preservative food. You might want to add sugar that is provided in the accessory packet to give it more flavor.

Desert's & Extra's: The pound cake was moist. It has a slight preservative taste but overall the flavor was good and enjoyable.

Drinks & Candy: Menus 11 comes with hazelnut flavor cocoa which was nice when Hot.

Overall Rating:

This is a highly recommended MRE, especially for vegetarians. It would have been nice to have an extra side to bulk up the meal, but overall I was satisfied with it's contents and taste. I would recommend to all MRE lovers, especially the vegetarians.

2007 Menu Chili & Macaroni

Chili And Macaroni Review By Todd Farino

I've eaten the Chili and Macaroni a few times, but most recently on November 7, 2008. A little military info on Chili Macaroni. In the chow halls or "Dining Facilities" as they like to be called now, Chili Macaroni or "Chili Mac" as the troops know it as is one of the most popular and most served meals. It is easy to cook and when cooked in large quantities it is still quite tasty. The Chili Macaroni I ate was from the 2007 MREs and is found in Case B (Menu #21). It can also be found in the 2008 MREs. How did it stand up? Here is the review:


Entree Taste: I have to say it was fantastic. Its not your dad's home cooked Chili Mac, but it's incredibly tasty and was actually a joy to eat. It was simply beef and and chili, nothing else. What gave it even better flavor was the red pepper and salt that came with it. I added about half the red pepper and a few spots of salt and mixed it in. After heating it up, it was one of the best MREs I've had to date. Some MREs have that "MRE taste". Chili Macaroni tastes the same as if it came right from the chow hall. The meat was not chewy, nor was the macaroni. The overall flavor was chili. The macaroni was simply along for the ride. So if you like chili and especially chili and macaroni you will love this MRE Entree.

Side Taste: To my surprise the Wet Fruit Pack was raspberry applesauce. I have to admit that I am fond of applesauce, but not from an MRE. It lacks the true applesauce flavor and was a bit runny. Don't get me wrong, it was edible, but the taste was weak. I did get a little inventive and used the sugar and added it to the raspberry applesauce and that made it much more tasty, but it was still running and bland, just with sugar over it. Next time I will give the applesauce to my kids. Maybe they will like it more.

Desserts and Extras: This is where this MRE scores even bigger points. The dessert wasn't my favorite, but an M&M cookie did hit the spot. As with most MRE cookies it was messy to eat with all the crumbs and a little hard, but it was very good and I had no problem polishing it off. It also came with its famous jalapeno cheese spread and wheat bread. The wheat bread is a favorite of mine. Its always soft and very good with a topping. You can eat it without a topping, but that would be very dry.


Drinks and Candy: This MRE came with a sugar free lemon-lime powder drink that was terrible. I didn't have much sugar left after using it for my applesauce, so I had to borrow some from my wife. The sugar made it drinkable, but you are better off just drinking water. This MRE came with candy and it was Skittles. A true pack of Skittles hit the spot and was a perfect ending to the meal.


Overall Rating:
Overall this was a great MRE. We highly recommend the entree if you purchase them separately, but if you purchase the whole MRE you will be happy with the overall taste of the meal. For our first review on GetMREs.com we couldn't have picked a better MRE.