A question regarding the ratpacks

[Jedadiah]

Biscuits Brown are good for propping open Landrover doors, If you have to eat biscuits, it must be Oatmeal or Fruit in that order. However, no one has really ever replaced Bacon grill or Bacon burgers. You can keep your cheese posessed and compo sausages, my menu was Chocolate powder and oat flakes for brekky, scoop of Pate and Oat meal biccy for Lunch then bacon grill or bacon burgers for evening meal. Plastic chocolate or (if we were lucky) Kendal mint cake to keep us ticking over during the day with heaps of boiled sweets that were sent back from Biafra 'cos no one like them there, they put blisters on your tongue!

 

[EdS]

oh deer - I like biscuits brown and the processed cheese. Anyone know where I ca nget a couple of tins of cheese?

 

[nickg]

Children Children

Biscuits brown - ab fab, chuck the rest away you can live on them, Never bunged me up.

Bacon grill - you can buy it in sainsburys just a sgood as ever.

Oatmeal blocks - with some milk & sugar - yum - but they will REALLY give you a run for your money

HAVE to agree about the treacle pud - It is totally indigestible. The treacle does go well on the Buiscuits fruit though

Dont even bother with the tea

Cheers
Nick

PS my dad jumped into france on D-Day and all he had to eat were pockets filled with - yup - buscuits brown or the 1944 equivalent. Hows that for indistructable

 

[Fin]

No word of a lie! - my record "stoppage" on compo was 10 days - the resultant "release" (up against a tree with a deep, deep hole dug) was seismic! This was in the days before the environmentalists, quite rightly, gripped this issue and ordered portaloos at every exercise location.
The sachet porridge was always hard currency before they discontinued it (huge blow to morale!) - you stuck a sachet of sugar in plus two of milk powder and a cup of boiling water. Stir, wait five minutes for it to amalgamate (turn to mush) then eat, straight out of the sachet - heaven! Compo has improved drastically since I first joined, but biscuits brown still make an appearance.....why?

 

[Tourist]

Oatmeal biccies, yummy. Do you know they used to come in tins of 10 .

Bacon grill, marvellous.

 

[Goose]

Yeah but you got spangles then! And 10 man tea bags

Soft squishy spangles! And rolos with arabic labels, why?!

 

[British Red]

Same as your rifles Goose - the cheapest bidder got the contract

 

[Goose]

Same as your rifles Goose - the cheapest bidder got the contract

Wouldn't be quite so bad if it was the cheapest!:bluThinki
Or better still just went for the EM2 50 years ago

 

[Jambo]

Soft squishy spangles! And rolos with arabic labels, why?!

Hahahaa, by the time the rolo's got to us, they were a few years out of date and covered in a whitish dust. Still tasted great though when you were wet cold and hungry...

IIRC, didn't FN put in a bid for the new (at the time) british army rifle but got the push in favour of the SA80?

 

[British Red]

Still cant beat a No.4 Mk II Goose - you got pleanty of training just carrying it , but I do love that rifle

Oh, for those who are hungry - I've just nipped into the pantry where there is a stack of these.....

No Bushcraft morning is quite the same without it. I'm told it lasts a person 2 days

Not me it doesn't!

Red

 

[Tourist]

Hahahaa, by the time the rolo's got to us, they were a few years out of date and covered in a whitish dust. Still tasted great though when you were wet cold and hungry...

IIRC, didn't FN put in a bid for the new (at the time) british army rifle but got the push in favour of the SA80?

As a Private, I along with about 10 others, was carefully selected to remove and replace 40,000 mars bars in 24 hr packs................oh happiness, I did'nt like Mars bars before we started.

Contenders for the SA80 slot included: M16 (chortle); Steyr Aug; H&K G11. When I left and joined the TA the unit I went to had just sent back its SA80's after 6 months of using them and received a consignment of M16A2's(better than the original black stick).

lee Emfield is OK Red, my dad taught me on it in Aden, but as a rifle I prefer the M14.

 

[Nat]

Oh gods, he mentioned the sabloody80 grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

i love rat packs, saw a mate eat 10 packets of biscuits brown for a dare!!

He woke us up later that night with major stomach cramp and off to the med centre he went for some "persuasion to release"

For some reason they never bunged me up.

 

[John Fenna]

First time I used an SMLE I near broke my shoulder, the Stirling went from target to sky in half a mag the Weobly revolver near broke my wrist but first time I fired an SA80 I got a 1 inch group and no pain.....
Better than the Turky pate at any rate and as to the non-meat sausages.........what are they? Is it leagal? Should they be banned?

 

[British Red]

As a Private, I along with about 10 others, was carefully selected to remove and replace 40,000 mars bars in 24 hr packs................oh happiness, I did'nt like Mars bars before we started.

Contenders for the SA80 slot included: M16 (chortle); Steyr Aug; H&K G11. When I left and joined the TA the unit I went to had just sent back its SA80's after 6 months of using them and received a consignment of M16A2's(better than the original black stick).

lee Emfield is OK Red, my dad taught me on it in Aden, but as a rifle I prefer the M14.

Aaah but sadly I can't have an M14 so I'll make do with my No.4 Mk II . It absolutely was the best bolt action military rifle ever made in my view. The M14 (and M1) were cracking rifles no question as was the FAL (SLR) but since I'm not allowed those I'll enjoy my piece of history

Oh, John, if you think the Smellie is bad, have a try on a No. 5 (Jungle Carbine) some time . I shot 450 rounds through one one afternoon. I was one big bruise by the end (but a happy bruise, shoulder muncher or not).

I do own a mouse gun (.223 Styer Scout) - its a very civilised round as you say but lacks some of the "real" feeling of the old .303s.

Anywhoo - sorry for the thread drift and, back on topic, guess what I found when tidying out the room of much kit?

Some proper compo bits and bobs, not MREs, we are talking the reall brassy tins

Included is a little tin of "matches and boiled sweets"

There must be a competiton here - oldest usable part of a ration pack!

Red

 

[nickg]

There must be a competiton here - oldest usable part of a ration pack!

Red

At 53 that could well be me!! - er does that count

Cheers
Nick

 

[Eric_Methven]

There must be a competiton here - oldest usable part of a ration pack!

Red

I've still got a part of a ration pack issued to me in 1974. I use it regularly - the compo tin opener. Invention of the century.

I do miss Tiffin bars though (chocolate bar with biscuit bits and raisins).

Eric

 

[Nat]

Now i'm hungry!!
Army's answer to the rubiks cube..................... Fox's glacier mints!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[Tourist]

I still have a compo tin opener to hand.........sad really, I wonder if should come under the listing of most useful inventions of the 20th Century.

Red, I do not own any guns nowadays. I did have an M14 when they were legal, along with other bits n' pieces. I fulfill my need for the smell of gunsmoke when I visit the US nowadays.

 

[Ferrion]

ahhh good old Oatmeal Blocks, couldn't agree more, best in the morning with a cup of tea

Although i love biscuits brown and the Pate or Cheese possesed (which you don't seem to get anymore), not personally fan of Biscuits fruit, but then again i also love green boilies.

And they can't get rid of the screech! what the hell else am i gonna mix my tequila with!!

 

[British Red]

Blimy - I'd forgotten Tiffin Bars - right up there with Poppets (bet they don't still make them).

Do you remember Pacers too - weird stripy minty opal fruits is the only way to describe them!

I agree about the screech though - especially Lemon!

Red