1977 Spaghetti with Meat Sauce Food Packet Long Range Patrol Review
Posted: Sat Oct 17, 2020 4:48 pm
I'd been looking forward to trying another one of these LRPs from a case of 1977 rations I recently acquired. I had kind of a weird hankering for a Mountain House Spaghetti so I decided to try this one for breakfast. Surely, many normal and perfectly sane folks have some old LRPs laying around to consume for breakfast, right?
Here's what it looked like inside of the packaging prior to removing the contents. Notice how the main entrée is wrapped in a cardboard sleeve. I've heard this was done to prevent holes from being poked in it.
A look at the contents and accessory packet items laid out.
The accessory packet contains 2 chocolate buttercrunch candies, toilet paper, 2 coffee instant type II packets, creamer, sugar, stim-u-dent interdental stimulator, and matches.
Here's a look at the spaghetti with meat sauce prior to adding water.
It smelled a lot like old cardboard so I was pretty skeptical but these all seem to smell pretty weird whether they are spoiled or not. I took a few small bites of it dehydrated and it tasted okay so I decided to add boiling water to it and let it set for about 5 minutes. In the meantime, I prepared the coffee with sugar. Unforutunely, the creamer was clumped up so I couldn't use it.
The 1977 version of this meal has nothing on the current production Oregon Freeze Dry Spaghetti with Meat Sauce. The beef was too chunky and I could really taste the salt in it. I think meatballs would have been better. It had a very cheap tomato sauce/paste flavor in comparison and the meat was pretty low quality because I think it had bits of bone in it. Overall, it was still edible but not the taste I was hoping for. I'm glad they've really improved these meals over the years. The two chocolate candies were no longer good. I took a small bite of both of them and they were pretty sour. The coffee was a good way to finish it off, I just wish this ration had cocoa included so I could make a mocha. Actually, I believe all rations should come with cocoa. 
Here's a look at the spaghetti with meat sauce prior to adding water.