US MRE 2014 Menu# 22 Asian Style Beef Strips With Vegetables

[BTemple]

There ended up being a little bit of a blizzard here today, the schools were all closed in my region, so thus, no work.
Realized that I had forgotten one of my rations from the B Case I had bought... I thought I had gone through the entire box, but alas, that was not so.

Here we have Menu # 22, the Asian Style Beef Strips with Vegetables.

The first thing I notice when I open the pouch and lay it all out is..... that's it??? And this is a recurring theme. Seems like this ration is a rather sparse when it comes to items and variety, which is rather disappointing. We've got the entree and a side of fried rice (I never particularly like rice in any ration I've had thus far), Twizzler Nibs, Wheat Snack Bread, Chunky Peanut Butter, Apple Jelly, Cocoa Beverage Powder and Accessory Packet C.

Upon opening the Twizzlers I'm met with the standard artificial cherry smell that I dislike, and since I don't really like the taste of cherry in any way, shape, or form, this was a disappointing dessert to have with this ration. I managed to pawn a handful of them off to my fiancee, and she NEVER wants to try any of the stuff in rations I eat, so at least I didn't have to throw all of them away. Hahaha

Up next we have the wheat snack bread, which I piled with the chunky peanut butter and apple jelly. This was perhaps the most fresh-tasting wheat snack bread I have ever had, not a hint of dryness to it at all. The chunky peanut butter is vastly superior to the regular peanut butter in every way, and even though I would have preferred grape jelly or strawberry jam, the apple jelly did go with this very well. Aside from the entree this was easily my favourite part of the ration.

I don't know what it is, but I never like cocoa beverage powder when I end up getting it.... I don't know if I put too much water in it or what, but it's just always horribly underwhelming... and as someone who doesn't drink coffee, I was not happy that this was the only thing to drink in the ration.

Now onto the main entree and side. First of all, here we have the fried rice laid out first.... the FRH didn't do a great job of heating the rice, so everything along the edges was still hard and had a sticky residue, while the center was at least broken up and palatable.
The main entree itself was heated perfectly and I poured it over the rice, hoping to liven it up a little bit. This entree uses the same type of beef as the Menu 24 Southwest Beef and Beans, so we're off to a good start. While there was no real discernible "Asian" flavour I could get from the ration, it was damn tasty. There was an ample amount of beef, and nice chunks of red pepper, corn, bamboo shoots and also some water chestnut. The rice itself had some flecks of peas and red pepper in it as well, but I could only eat about half of it. I sorta ate around the rice and made sure not to waste any of the entree itself. It was absolutely fantastic, I wish they could have gotten rid of the rice and just gave a large portion of the entree.

All in all this was a "meh" kind of ration, it had a couple VERY good items, and then a number of not so good items. It would sit pretty well in the middle of all of the rations I've had thus far.... perfectly neutral. Haha

Thanks for stopping by, hope you all have a good one.

PS: I've finally gotten into trying my hand at making ration reviews on YouTube. My channel is and it'd be great if you could give my first video a watch and subscribe! It's very rough as I hadn't rigged up a way to hold my phone sensibly, but I should be getting a good tripod in the mail any day now, so then things should go along MUCH more smoothly. Thanks!

[Conrad]

Nice to see you started a channel, I'll check that out.
I've had this ration a few times, it's fairly high up the list for me in terms of the main entree anyway because of the reasonable amount of beef and veg.
I got lucky the last time because I got two FRHs and also two spoons for some reason . as a result I was able to get the rice and the beef both nice and warm. I must say though, the US FRHs in general are very poor compared to some of the heaters in European rations. They usually get to acceptably warm at best, whereas a Lithuanian one for example will get actually hot and there will be steam spraying out of it.

[BTemple]

Nice to see you started a channel, I'll check that out.
I've had this ration a few times, it's fairly high up the list for me in terms of the main entree anyway because of the reasonable amount of beef and veg.
I got lucky the last time because I got two FRHs and also two spoons for some reason . as a result I was able to get the rice and the beef both nice and warm. I must say though, the US FRHs in general are very poor compared to some of the heaters in European rations. They usually get to acceptably warm at best, whereas a Lithuanian one for example will get actually hot and there will be steam spraying out of it.

2 FRH's would have been great. I give all of my left-over FRH's to a science teacher colleague of mine, it's great to show how a galvanic cell works.
I find I put a bit of extra salt in the MRE FRH's no matter how old they are, just to try to squeeze every possible degree of heat out of it. Hahaha

[Biobrew]

Thanks for the review. That wheat snack bread with peanut butter and apple jelly looks delicious.

[BTemple]

Thanks for the review. That wheat snack bread with peanut butter and apple jelly looks delicious.

It was perhaps the best combination I've had thus far in an MRE... every component was perfect. Still not as good as IMP bread with peanut butter and strawberry jam though

[MarksMRE]

Kewl write up and I really liked the pictures to go with it. Nice visuals. Great job

[BTemple]

Kewl write up and I really liked the pictures to go with it. Nice visuals. Great job

Thanks man! I love doing the written reviews... the historian in me likes to chronicle the journey. Haha

[parafireboy]

Kewl write up and I really liked the pictures to go with it. Nice visuals. Great job

Thanks man! I love doing the written reviews... the historian in me likes to chronicle the journey. Haha

Great review and pics, thanks for sharing!

I prefer doing written reviews as well. Besides, nobody wants or needs to see my ugly mug or listen to me blather on anyway.

[BTemple]

Kewl write up and I really liked the pictures to go with it. Nice visuals. Great job

Thanks man! I love doing the written reviews... the historian in me likes to chronicle the journey. Haha

Great review and pics, thanks for sharing!

I prefer doing written reviews as well. Besides, nobody wants or needs to see my ugly mug or listen to me blather on anyway.

Nobody thinks you've got dulcet tones like Steve??? Haha

[Biobrew]

Thanks for the review. That wheat snack bread with peanut butter and apple jelly looks delicious.

I don't remember posting this, but coincidentally I bought a Menu 22 Asian Beef strips yesterday along with 3 other MREs. As soon as I got home I tore open three of them like a kid at Christmas, hoping to find some components I hadn't tried before. Sure enough, in the Menu 22 I found a wheat snack bread and apple jelly. I dug out a peanut butter packet that I had saved form another meal, and put it together exactly as you pictured, and yes, it was delicious.

Now I know!