Hi,
I've just received a small lot of French packs so I've decited to try the RIE for lunch.
RIE - Ration Individuelle d'Exercice is the French cousin of the US TOTM: it countains 1 meal + snacks but no "bivouac" items (matches, heater, water purification pills...). All the components are the same as the RCIR ones.
RIE box
the open RIE pack
the contents: entrée, pâté, dessert, 6 biscuits: 3 plain, 3 sweet, 1 fruit bar, 1 chocolat bar, 1 pack tissues
the venison pâté. Quite good, no strong game tasting. It's much much better on French bread but OK on a biscuit.
The entrée: pork "salad", note it's made by the same compagny as the Dutch entrees.
The entree itself, very good with big chunks of pork meat (not spam like) some beans and vegetables. As there's no Caesar dressing or other strong sauce, it's as good cold as warm. No preservative aftertaste as in the old RCIR meals.
The dessert "semolina pudding with raisins" very close to the German EPA Grießspeise but ...more French ;)
The fruit bar, this one is pineapple flavored, not bad for those who like the French traditionnal "pâtes de fruits"
Hi,
we sometimes had a baguette bread supplied before we go for a field exercise. So bad I didn't take a pictures of the line of soldiers, all carrying a baguette stuck in the backpack just like a radiotelephone antenna
in the exercises in the Spanish army were a loaf of bread, known as "chusco" to accompany the ration, at least a few years ago it (about 20 years). one fact: the corporals and sergeants call rehired "chusqueros" ( corporal chusquero, seargent chusquero) by the large number of loaves of bread which they ate in a long time of military service (the "chusco" also occurred in the barracks food diarial
and if the loaf of bread had a sausage in it was called "chusco preñado " (pregnant bread)
Hola Saladp!
muchas gracias por sus comentarios y por la información!
We sometimes had some similar little breads, sometimes a baguette bread for 2 guys and sometimes (the worst case!) a pack of HARD HARD HARD crackers called pain de guerre, even worst than the German "panzer sheets"
We didn't give the little bread a special name and there was no kind of military folklore attached to them
Hola,
rations are called "rasquettes" in French army slang. It means nothing, just a little funny name. The corned beef is traditionally called "singe" in French: monkey. The veterans used to tell the kids that the original WWI corned beef was made from monkey meat but it's obviously a joke
