Commonly Known as SOS. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Creamed Ground Beef -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Yield: 4 Meat, Fish, And Poultry Portion: 5 1/2 oz Mil. ID: L 030 00 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Ingredient Weight Measure Issue Beef, ground, bulk, raw, 90% lean 11 1/2 oz Onions, fresh, chopped 5/8 oz 1 Tbsp tsp 1-1/8 LBS Flour, wheat, general purpose 1 1/16 oz 3 Tbsp tsp Salt 1/16 oz tsp Pepper, black, ground oz tsp Water, warm 14 1/16 oz 1 Cup 10 Tbsp tsp Worcestershire sauce 1/16 oz tsp Milk, nonfat, dry 13/16 oz 5 Tbsp tsp -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Method 1 Cook beef in steam jacketed kettle or roasting pan until beef loses its pink color, stirring to break apart. Drain or skim off excess Fat. Add onions; stir-cook 3 minutes. 2 Combine flour, salt and pepper. Sprinkle evenly over beef and onions. Mix thoroughly; cook about 5 minutes until flour is Absorbed. 3 Reconstitute milk. Blend worcestershire sauce into milk. Add to meat mixture. 4 Heat to a simmer, stirring frequently. Cook 10 minutes or until thickened. Ccp: internal temperature must reach 155ºF or higher For 15 seconds. Hold for service at 140ºF or higher.
On the remote radar site Shemya that I spent a year on, we only had powdered eggs and powdered milk available. The Cook would ask you how you wanted your eggs and you would reply " a couple over easy please " He would then take his Ice Cream scoop and gently place two scoops on your tray.
They still sell the Vietnam era 'C' rations for as much as $40 as a collectable. Don't remember them being worth that much when you had to eat a can of 'salted pork' on a 'John Wayne' cracker...
Yes the 'C' stood for combat. Here is a picture of what most Vietnam era ones came with. Notice that the 'Fruit' can is bloated. Not to be eaten of course. You would get a bloated can, hold it up and proclaim you got one with 'extra' filling! If you didn't smoke, cigs were good trade material.
"A lot of people think that the distress signal is an abbreviation for “save our souls” or “save our ship.” But in reality, "save our souls" and "save our ship" are backronyms, and the letters don’t actually stand for anything" . "In fact, the signal isn’t even really supposed to be three individual letters. It’s just a continuous Morse code string of three dots, three dashes, and three dots all run together with no spaces or full stops (…---…). Since three dots form the letter "S" and three dashes form an “O” in International Morse code, though, the signal came to be called an “SOS” for the sake of convenience. That connection has led to the letters coming into their own as a visual distress signal divorced from Morse Code, and those in need of rescue sometimes spell them out on the ground to be seen from above".
Love the stuff especially if it is made with chipped beef. At one time I used to keep beef and pork renderings to use as additional fat if the protein didn't have anything to give up like sliced beef. I never had any problem at all with Army mess. It was always filling, healthy, good tasting and I could have all I wanted if time allowed which for the first few months was very little. The further back in line I was determined how much time I had to eat. There was actually a time, as a civilian, when all I had was a couple of pieces of bacon, a couple slices of bread, a little flour and some powdered milk. I didn't have the Lea & Perrin but a little pepper and salt had to do. WHAT a feast!!!
Okay, that's all good but where the heck is the P38? Somebody has to have one or ya have to grind the sides of the top on a rock to get them open. I carried one on my tag chain for several years. Dunno whatever happened to it or my tags. Yeah, Vietnam era C-rats were pretty good compared to the K's and the cigs were okay too if you smoked Kents, Lucky's or whatever menthol was going at the time. I used to try to have at least a half a case under my seat when I was a door gunner because we never knew where we might set down for the night. One time it proved out to be pretty lucky because I also managed to have about a half a case of beer stashed behind the C-rats. On one particular Combat Assault a few rounds hit about 10 inches under my seat. Blew some holes in the C-rats but they gave their lives for my beer which was left unharmed.
I always heard that the best military food was available on submarines. IT was designed to be better to make up for the poor and crowded conditions that were available on a sub. I know someone who was on one, I should ask him what he thought about it. I think that military food in some sectors has gotten better than it used to be. I think that the food might take a little getting used to no matter where you were or where you were stationed...not exactly like mom used to make!
Every branch of the military boasts of it's culinary acumen but yes, the subs did have some remarkable food right down to the lobster, steaks and shrimp, according to a Navy commander that I knew. It's all about moral....... If the food's good the moral will follow! In the late 80's the U.S. military joined forces and entered the World Culinary Arts Olympics and won in all catagories. Of course, with the assets of the military what could go wrong? If something had to be prepared such as a "Sugar Pull" display, instead of preparing it on site like most of the other competitors had to do, they made it in a temperature safe environment and then simply flew it to the competition.
Let me share this simple recipe I learned from my father-in-law. He was a veteran of the second world war in the guerrilla troops that fought side by side with the Americans. He said that one of the best food he ate while stationed in the mountains of Sierra Madre was corned beef and baked beans. They would open a can of corned beef and a can of beans and mix it. Presto, they have a meal already. But when there are vegetable gardens around, they would search for cabbage that they would chop and mixed with corned beef. But unlike the first recipe which doesn't need heating, this one should be cooked so the cabbage will be more palatable.