UN 12 hour Patrol Combat Ration Occidental 2

Reviews of rations from abroad - British ration packs, EPA, IMP, RCIR, etc.
Post Reply
HeinrichFuchs
Posts: 31
Joined: Sun May 17, 2020 11:07 am

UN 12 hour Patrol Combat Ration Occidental 2

Post by HeinrichFuchs » Mon Sep 28, 2020 12:59 pm

I should probably preface the following review with the fact that this is the first time I am doing a more in depth review of a ration. My apologies if something is omitted, or incorrectly done.

The front of the package, erroneously sold as a UK armed forces ration. Thankfully the whole bag is intact, including the TTI showing the contents as good, though this isn't surprising giving this ration is barely 4 months over from the Best Before date.

"This Patrol ORP has enough food to provide 2000kcals, equivalent to half your daily energy requirements. It contains a balance of all nutrients, vitamins and minerals - you should eat all food items to maintain good health and performance." As per the instruction/ingredients slip.

Image

Weight is around 0.9kg, with the contents not only written in English but also French. Packing date is 2018-03-13, with a BBE of 2020-05. Though, plenty of the components last a few months longer than this date. Bit surprised to find a rating sheet in this ration, as I figured only UK rations came with that.

Image
Image

Contents unpacked and ready to be eaten. I will not bother opening the accessory package, as it doesn't contain anything I need right now, but do come in handy during hikes. It also came with a fairly powerful FRH that I forgot to include in the picture, as well as a instruction/ingredients breakdown slip.

Image

I decided not to heat the main up, which consists of Chicken and Vegetable curry with rice. Quite a good portion at 350g, at 125kcal/100g. Meat was quite tender along with what I suspect are peas and vegetables, unfortunately the meat seemed to have pooled at the bottom, despite some kneading prior to opening. In the end I decided to add some salt and pepper, which really hit the spot! A bit more spicy than your average MRE in my experience, unless it is specifically designed to be hot. It was quite filling and didn't feel all too proccessed, even if it all did seem to be quite a "blob" of food that didn't really break apart too easily, which I suspect the rice helped with, but was very easy to chew and get down. Thumbs up!

The ration also came with two drinks, one isotonic and one protein based. The pink-ish colored one is supposed to be Cranberry, albeit all I could taste was a very.. medicinal taste, almost bordering on something akin to chlorine. Only had a few sips off this one, even if it hasn't gone bad, it ain't my kinda drink.

The second one sat far better, even though I am usually not a fan of protein drinks in these rations, this one mixed well and had a fairly light scent of apple, along with being generally sweet. Adding small amounts of powder into the water and mixing seemed to solve the issue of it clumping together, and while I am still not a convinced, I certainly enjoyed this one the most.

Image
Image

Below are the remaining parts of the ration, a Chockablock, Sesame bar, a fruit bar, tropical fruit and nut mix and a apple bun.

Image
Image
Image
Image
Image

The Chockablock, despite showing some wear and tear and what appears to be some slight bloom, was still very tasty. Quite sweet and soft to bite into, not a bad snack for eating on the go. I will not be bothering with the sesame bar, as I have already had the misfortunte of trying to eat them on a few occassions, I am unsure of whether they've gone past their best by, or if they are really made to be as hard as they are, and whether the lot should stick together ( I would assume not ). I have heard they can pair well with a cup of coffee, unfortunately this ration only came with two cold drinks, so I might just brew a cup and see how it goes.

The fruit bar wasn't quite as fruit-y nor as soft as I remember them being, despite that, it was a quite good and chewy snack. Sugar coated but not that much of an fruity taste, which was a bit disappointing. In comparison to the French fruit bars, these just seem like flavourless, sugar coated gelatin bars. Though, they have a spot in it all, i'm sure! Tropical fruit and nut mix carried a bit more flavour than the unsalted, unsweetened and just plain old nut mixes that I have had in previous rations like these. Unfortunately the fruits didn't have all too much flavour, mainly making the rest of the mix a bit sweet, but it was still a nice change of pace, not only with flavour but texture.

And the last piece being the apple cinnamon bun. I have to say that I absolutely love these, along with the Bridgford sandwiches I have tried so far. A lot of cinnamon and apple taste, with what felt like it might have been solid bits of apple thrown into the jam. Very soft bread that breaks apart easily and quite sweet, this is nothing but a absolute win in my book. The only thing I can complain about was that there was no coffee or cocoa drink to go along with it, that would really have hit the spot in my humble opinion. Also noticed I missed to include the package of gums, though it isn't something I intend to open right now, either, hopefully it wont make or break the rest of the review ;)

With that I will be finishing this review, if anyone happens to have any questions about it that I didn't cover or missed, feel free to let me know. I would also like to apologize for the varying sizes of the photos, it's been a while since I directly linked images on a forum, so I have forgot how to make them into thumbnails/smaller size. The photo host seemed to agree on resizing most though, but a few photos didn't quite agree.

User avatar
rareauldmealtimes
Posts: 173
Joined: Sat Feb 02, 2019 10:22 am

Re: UN 12 hour Patrol Combat Ration Occidental 2

Post by rareauldmealtimes » Fri Oct 02, 2020 3:13 pm

Hey, great review! I just checked out a Halal menu #2 so it's really cool to see another one of these things. I thought that apple protein drink was so awful, worst protein drink I've had in a ration! Interesting to see you liked it! My Pineapple beverage base was really great and barely made up for that apple protein thing... I was surprised to see you enjoying that "Chockablock", I thought it was so utterly disappointing with its fake wax-like chocolate taste and appearance! I was glad to see you compare the fruit bar to the RCIR pate de fruits as that is what I thought it was. So, I'm not going to buy one of these just for one of those! Fruit nut mix, yeah... pretty boring. I'm not a fan of those bun things either. In general I thought my ration was very "meh" but it's not surprising due to how wide of an audience these rations are designed for. Geez, I sound really negative. The ration is perfectly "fine" but let's put it this way. I really didn't want to finish eating the whole thing! hah! :D

Thank you for the fantastic review!

HeinrichFuchs
Posts: 31
Joined: Sun May 17, 2020 11:07 am

Re: UN 12 hour Patrol Combat Ration Occidental 2

Post by HeinrichFuchs » Fri Oct 02, 2020 4:12 pm

rareauldmealtimes wrote:
Fri Oct 02, 2020 3:13 pm
Hey, great review! I just checked out a Halal menu #2 so it's really cool to see another one of these things. I thought that apple protein drink was so awful, worst protein drink I've had in a ration! Interesting to see you liked it! My Pineapple beverage base was really great and barely made up for that apple protein thing... I was surprised to see you enjoying that "Chockablock", I thought it was so utterly disappointing with its fake wax-like chocolate taste and appearance! I was glad to see you compare the fruit bar to the RCIR pate de fruits as that is what I thought it was. So, I'm not going to buy one of these just for one of those! Fruit nut mix, yeah... pretty boring. I'm not a fan of those bun things either. In general I thought my ration was very "meh" but it's not surprising due to how wide of an audience these rations are designed for. Geez, I sound really negative. The ration is perfectly "fine" but let's put it this way. I really didn't want to finish eating the whole thing! hah! :D

Thank you for the fantastic review!
Thanks!

I tried one of the Halal menus as well, as one or two Hindu menus. I recall either the Hindu or Halal menu was actually quite tasty through and through, while the others are a bit of an hit and miss. Though I will agree these protein drinks are far from the cream of the crop, they're not bad.. though I am a bit hard pressed to think of something worse. If one is in the field and this is what is provided, I can only imagine it is far more serviceable than when it is being eaten in the comfort of ones place. I do recall a few beverages in the other bags were far, far more palpatable than whatever the regular drink was.. That one I can say for certain is the absolute worst thing i've ever tried in a ration.

Chocolate definitely doesn't feel like genuine milk chocolate, but does bring back some fond memories of getting cheap chocolate treats and such, not a taste I find bad by any stretch, though I can certainly understand if not everyone falls in love with it ;) And the fruit bar definitely only seems comparable to the jelly bar found in RCIRs, granted I have only tried one so far, but I have another one waiting. Will probably try to stock up on those, quite a few interesting main dishes i'd love to try.

Though I can only agree with your last few sentences, it isn't a very all thrills ration, but I am sure it does the job it needs to do. A few things I haven't seen in other rations I got to try with these ones as well, so all in all, I quite enjoyed it. Don't think I will be in a rush to get them again, though.

Post Reply