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I wanted to share this listing I saw on Ebay UK yesterday;
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/24-Hour-Unope ... 0902583238

It is a 1970's vintage GS 24hr ration in a metal container! I have never seen on of those before only the late 1980's vintage in the cardboard boxes.

Pics from another website I found;
http://www.forces80.com/ration_pack.htm

Looks like the British have had the Oatmeal Block for a few decades! If you do a google search you can also find the nicknames and descriptions of the old rations and the slang terms veterans use to refer to the different meals.

the rations at the top are genuine , but the box is NOT,obviously the original box has been damaged and somebody has put it in a H82 ammo can, these rations had been used by the british army from the 50s (my service career started in 1977, and we used this type of ration , i gave one to my father and he told me it was identical to the
rations they used in malaya in the early 50s )the ration at the bottom is a gs and the first time i got one of these was in 1980 and they stayed with this until the early90s.
the good old days ,i often wonder how we managed to survive with 4 menus.WHAT your a VEGITARIAN,well you can eat f****** biscuits and jam then,WHAT your a MUSLIM, well you can eat f****** jam then , my old sargent would say

Now I see the hinge to the ammo container! I missed that at first, good eye. The paste tubes kind of look like the old (1950's) NBC Atropine injectors I have seen pic of! Speaking of those old menu's I wonder what the Bacon grill tasted like? SPAM? How about steak and kidney pudding? I bet menu fatigue was horrible too but I think you could mix it all the cans together and get a new menu creation!

the bacon grill is good . but you know it not good for you ,kind of a way. too much fat and cheap cuts(probabaly ears and lips ) ,it also sticks to you mess tins but smells and tastes great first thing on a cold morning with a mug of coffee.Check http://www.arrse.co.uk/wiki/Bacon_Grill .the steak and kidney pudding were called babies heads i dont remember ration fatique because we were always hungery ry the british army had a policy of bullets first, so you could go hungery often, either on a big exercise or on ops,in the late 70s or early 80s you never seen dumpsters loaded with rations like you do now paras and marines during the falklands almost resorted to eating the leather off the boots to survive

I still can't get over the fact that when I hear "pudding" I immediately think dessert. Steak and kidney pudding it just sounds odd. All of the puddings in British rations are very different that our types of puddings.

On a side note I had a 4 man British Ration I don't remember the package date but was probably late 80's early 90's but it for sure had the metal type cans. I remember one meat was something like boned chicken or turkey? I noticed "tin" discoloration inside the cans like the covering of the cans was flaking off inside the can. I wonder if this was common in those older British rations.

the pudding is similar to i suppose ,beef stew and dumplings,its a cross between a stew and a pie
as to 4 man rations they were the preserve of the tankie and nobody else ever saw them

Yea I had to use Google images to check out a pic of the Steak and Kidney pudding, my imagination was running wild with my own interpretations!

Found another older British Ration on Ebay;

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/military-rati ... 0716794151

that looks very dodgy, biscuits fruit ab came in with the gp rations1978-80, and i would think anything from 1956 would need a tin opener and or have a roll top ( like the old corned beef) cans of beer didnt even have a ring pull until the 70s never mind army spread

I was thinking the same thing it seems to me like the items were "placed" inside an older ration container..