[00:00] they knew that it might be some time before&nbsp; they would have a freshly cooked meal.&nbsp;&nbsp; Instead, they were handed boxes of Krations,&nbsp; three boxes a day containing full meals,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[00:12] which included biscuits like these K-1 defense&nbsp;biscuits, which I'm going to make using the&nbsp;specifications from 1942. So thank you&nbsp;to Hungryroot for sponsoring this video as I&nbsp;feast or at least survive on the K-ration of&nbsp;World War II,
[00:25] this time on Tasting History. which was something that American soldiers could&nbsp;cook or at least heat up when they were near&nbsp;the front lines.
[00:41] But today, I am going to be&nbsp;discussing a ration, the K-ration, which needs&nbsp;no cooking, no heating, no nothing. It was developed for paratroopers landing before an&nbsp; invasion and it was three individual boxed meals,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[00:54] breakfast, dinner, and supper, which provided&nbsp; between 2,800 and 3200 calories a day. Now originally, this video was going to be a&nbsp; little bit different cuz I wasn't going to&nbsp;have any actual cooking. I was just going to&nbsp;kind of go through the different components&nbsp;of the K-ration, kind of an unboxing.
[01:08] But during&nbsp;my research, I actually came across the original&nbsp;1942 specifications that were given out by the US&nbsp;Army Quartermaster Corps, two companies making the&nbsp;biscuits inside the K-ration, or at least the two&nbsp;types of biscuits being made at the time.
[01:24] See before 1942, the ration included a pemmican&nbsp; biscuit, which in addition to wheat and oats,&nbsp;&nbsp; Reviled by&nbsp;the people who actually had to eat these pemmican&nbsp;biscuits they were quickly replaced by the K-1&nbsp;defense biscuit and the K-2 Graham biscuit,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[01:39] [clack clack] And by the end of the war, they&nbsp;had actually introduced some more biscuits and&nbsp;had replaced the K-2 biscuit, but the K-1 defense&nbsp;biscuit stuck around to the very end. So, that is&nbsp;the one that I'm going to make.
[01:53] Now the recipe is very specific. So, I'm going to use grams to&nbsp;do this recipe. So, I can be very specific in the&nbsp;amounts, but I'm also going to reduce the amount&nbsp;because the original recipe calls for like 73&nbsp;pounds of flour.
[02:09] I'm going to simply call for 73&nbsp;grams of whole wheat flour, 103 grams of wheat flour,&nbsp;all purpose, 100 grams of soybean flour, 70 grams fine cut&nbsp;oatmeal, 112 grams whole eggs, 70 grams dried skim milk,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[02:24] 24 grams sugar, 12 grams molasses, 114 grams of shortening,&nbsp;3 grams of ammonium bicarbonate or baking soda works,&nbsp;&nbsp; So that is&nbsp;a lot of ingredients for a biscuit. And actually,&nbsp;in hindsight, this turned out to be the most&nbsp; difficult biscuit or cookie of any kind&nbsp;&nbsp;
[02:42] that I think I have ever made. Takes a lot of&nbsp; kneading, we'll we'll get to that. And so,&nbsp;after a full day of filming and cooking in&nbsp; the kitchen and kneading until my arms hurt,&nbsp;&nbsp; I&nbsp;really rely on the easy and delicious meals that I&nbsp;get from today's sponsor, Hungryroot.
[03:01] So, Hungryroot&nbsp;has done this really cool thing where you can&nbsp;essentially make a cookbook within the website of&nbsp;different recipes that you like to get from them&nbsp;&nbsp; I have made&nbsp;a cookbook on there and it's called Off The Clock&nbsp;quick recipes to make after work.
[03:16] I cook all day,&nbsp;so often at the end of the day, the last thing I&nbsp;want to do is cook more. And so, these are some&nbsp;wonderful recipes that you can make in a jiff.&nbsp;&nbsp; Like the honey garlic beef with cilantro&nbsp;lime rice. Tender beef with a sweet and&nbsp;tangy glaze over rice in about 10 minutes.&nbsp;
[03:29] One of my favorites because it's fast, filling, and I&nbsp; just love the sauce. In fact, I like the sauce so&nbsp;much that I included it as a single grocery item&nbsp; that you can get and pretty much put on anything.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[03:41] There are also some of my favorite snacks from&nbsp; Hungryroot, like the Himalayan pink salt popcorn&nbsp;from Lesser Evil So check out my Hungryroot digital cookbook and&nbsp; find some recipes that are right for you.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[03:53] Just click the link in the description or scan this&nbsp; QR code and it'll take you right to the cookbook&nbsp;&nbsp; Of course, right now I am on the clock, so I need&nbsp;to get back to making them biscuits.
[04:05] So start by&nbsp;adding together all of the dry ingredients in a&nbsp;big bowl. All three flours, the oatmeal, dry&nbsp;milk, sugar, salt, cinnamon, and bicarbonate.&nbsp;&nbsp; Whisk these all up and then add in the eggs. 112&nbsp; grams turned out to be about two large eggs.
[04:19] Then add&nbsp;the molasses. And finally, the shortening. Now, I&nbsp;decided to melt my shortening because it does make&nbsp;it easier to mix the dough. Though, I'm not really&nbsp;sure if that was the right move because this dough&nbsp;was very difficult to mix together. continued to work it, but it just kept crumbling&nbsp; to pieces. And it's probably because it is so dry.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[04:37] The requirements state that moisture content of&nbsp; the finished product shall not exceed 7%.&nbsp;&nbsp; That is wicked low. Like, most cookies are like 40% or&nbsp; something like that. But I didn't feel so bad that&nbsp;I was having trouble with this because I found&nbsp;a quote from the manager of a biscuit making&nbsp;company
[04:55] who was tasked with making these biscuits.&nbsp;And he said that "This is the most difficult mix I&nbsp;have ever tried to put together." But eventually&nbsp;the dough did come together and it smoothed out&nbsp;nicely. But I do think that that's because it's&nbsp;humid and I kept washing my hands
[05:10] which added more moisture to the dough. But there it is.&nbsp;It ended up working out. At this point,&nbsp;&nbsp; I was ready to roll out my biscuits. Here, the&nbsp; instructions say, "Biscuits shall be rectangular&nbsp;in shape with dimensions approximately and not&nbsp;exceeding 3 and 3/16 inches long, 1 and 3/16 in wide,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[05:28] Not going to lie, I was&nbsp;not as precise as all that, but I think I&nbsp;came pretty close. The actual biscuits were made&nbsp;with industrial molds, and that's just a standard&nbsp;I can't meet. At this point, you put them on a&nbsp;baking sheet and poke some holes in the top so&nbsp;they don't puff up too much.
[05:44] And then transfer&nbsp;to the oven and bake at 350°Fahrenheit, 175° C for 20 minutes. So, at first I questioned why&nbsp;these biscuits had to be so precise in their&nbsp;size. I mean, I think this is the only recipe&nbsp;that I've ever seen that uses 16th of inches.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[05:59] But then once you see the box that they need to&nbsp; be packaged in, and how tightly packed they&nbsp;need to be you get a better idea of why they&nbsp;had to be a specific size. So,
[06:11] I'm going to&nbsp;start unpacking these K-ration boxes as I tell&nbsp;you a bit about the history of the K-ration. if you want a super deep dive, then&nbsp; check out the website kration.info,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[06:31] they cover every component of the K-ration,&nbsp; and they really did their homework. So the K-ration boxes that I have here are, of&nbsp; course, reproductions. And specifically,&nbsp;they're reproductions of the boxes that came out&nbsp;near the end of the war.
[06:44] For most of the life&nbsp;of the K-ration, they were simply cardboard&nbsp;boxes double dipped in wax that had either&nbsp;breakfast unit, dinner unit, or supper unit&nbsp;printed on the front with the letter B, D,&nbsp;or S on the side.
[06:56] And there were no details on&nbsp;exactly what was inside the box. "Opening a K ration&nbsp;was similar to opening a package of Cracker&nbsp;Jacks and that you never knew what was inside..." The only issue was that often, even after you&nbsp;opened the pack, you had trouble figuring out&nbsp;exactly what you were eating.
[07:12] So eventually they&nbsp;did start writing on the back what was inside of&nbsp;the box. Like this breakfast says that it includes&nbsp;"meat and eggs: eat cold, or after heating by&nbsp;boiling can in water." And here we find that can. Now&nbsp;the can itself is indicative of the latter part of&nbsp;the war
[07:28] because it is painted a dark color to make&nbsp;it camouflage. The reason for that was made clear&nbsp;in a report by the quartermaster corps after the&nbsp;action in North Africa. "Littering the roadsides&nbsp;with empty, shiny tins guided enemy aircraft along&nbsp;the routes and bivouacs of American convoys."
[07:44] So not only did they camouflage the cans, but they&nbsp; added some writing on the box. "For security,&nbsp;do not discard the empty can, paper, or refuse&nbsp;where it can be seen from the air. If possible,&nbsp;cover with dirt, foliage, sand, etc."
[07:58] And it&nbsp;makes you wonder how many of these empty cans&nbsp;are still buried just slightly beneath the&nbsp;soil throughout Europe and the South Pacific.&nbsp;&nbsp; The writing on the box also suggested that&nbsp; soldiers "Open inner bag carefully. It may be used&nbsp;as a waterproof container for matches, cigarettes,&nbsp;etc."
[08:13] And that is because one of the key components&nbsp;of all three K-ration boxes throughout the day was&nbsp;cigarettes. But most&nbsp;people at the time, they smoked their cigarettes.&nbsp;These are Chesterfield cigarettes. Milder, cooler,&nbsp;better taste.
[08:30] And these were one of the ones that the soldiers seemed to like. They liked&nbsp;Camels, Chesterfield, Lucky Strike, and Philip&nbsp;Morris. But soldiers would complain when they'd&nbsp;open their ration and it would have Fleetwoods or&nbsp;Chelsea cigarettes, off-brand cigarettes, I guess.
[08:44] I don't know. I don't smoke, but I guess those&nbsp;were the lesser cigarette of the time. a packet of soluble coffee, that is instant&nbsp; coffee, a fruit bar, and assorted biscuits.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[08:56] I'm going to start with this soluble coffee. This&nbsp;is Nescafe, and it just says to mix it into&nbsp;&nbsp; a third canteen cup, which is 8 ounces of hot or&nbsp; cold water. And then add some sugar if you want.
[09:19] See how this tastes. Comes with four&nbsp; sugar cubes from Jack Frost tablet sugar.&nbsp;&nbsp; And so I'm going to toss one of those&nbsp;in as well. I like sugar in my coffee.
[09:34] That works better if it's really hot water. This&nbsp; is like lukewarm water. We'll give it a try. Actually, that's not bad. That's&nbsp; not bad at all. Tastes like coffee.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[09:47] and I'll try that. But it also says that&nbsp;you can make into jam by stewing 3 to 5&nbsp;minutes in about four spoonfuls of water. [chomp]
[10:02] Feel like&nbsp;that's something I get at Whole Foods.&nbsp;&nbsp; Then I'm going to take the rest and I'm&nbsp; going to kind of break it up here, I guess,&nbsp;&nbsp; and put it into some some warm water, hot water,&nbsp; I guess, in a little cup.
[10:18] So, while it stews I'll talk about the two&nbsp;biscuits. This one is three biscuits and&nbsp;this one is four. Which the- the size of the&nbsp;biscuit being so specific, one of those things is the width.
[10:34] So that three and four of two&nbsp;different types of biscuits can be the same.&nbsp;&nbsp; Anyway, again with the&nbsp;very specific sizes. Okay, I'm going to open thi
[10:47] Nabisco. So this would have been&nbsp; made by the Nabisco Company. [chomp] Super bland.
[10:59] Hm. So I think that this is actually the K-1&nbsp; biscuit, the one that I'm making today.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[11:11] Tastes very healthy. Let's try the second biscuit.&nbsp;&nbsp; [chomp] Crispier, still flavorless.
[11:26] All right, so after&nbsp;5 minutes, it did not turn to jam. Maybe I used&nbsp;too much water, but I don't think less water&nbsp;would have made a difference. It just kind of&nbsp;like crumbled up, which I guess then&nbsp; at least you can put it on something. So that's what I'm going to do. I'm going&nbsp; to put it on this flavorless biscuit.
[11:41] [chomp] Now I'm not shocked that the biscuits don't&nbsp;taste good because they were one of the most&nbsp;complained about aspects of these boxes,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[11:56] even though they're kind of the the main component&nbsp; of all of them- there were a lot of complaints.&nbsp;&nbsp; It was basically that off-brand cigarettes and&nbsp;another component which we'll have to find in the&nbsp;dinner box.
[12:09] So this is the dinner K-ration and it&nbsp;also has plenty of writing on the box, including&nbsp;something that was added in February of 1944. It&nbsp;said, "Notice: mosquito bites cause malaria. If&nbsp;you are in a malaria zone, keep your shirt on and&nbsp;your sleeves rolled down.
[12:25] Use mosquito repellent&nbsp;when out of doors between sunset and sunrise." Now, I would guess that that warning is for those&nbsp;who are fighting in the Pacific and not the people&nbsp;in France and Italy. But then I questioned,&nbsp;&nbsp; did they have malaria in Italy? And so I did a quick&nbsp; Google search and I found this really cool map&nbsp;&nbsp;
[12:43] from World War II which showed where malaria could&nbsp; occur and Italy was actually high on the list.&nbsp;&nbsp; It was put out by the War Department and it's not&nbsp; simply a map but rather a map with a character&nbsp;drawn by Theodore Geisel,
[12:56] "This is Ann... she drinks blood! Her full&nbsp;name is Anopheles Mosquito and she's dying to&nbsp;meet you." I just love stuff like that. I would&nbsp;love to get a full-size version of that poster and put it on my wall.
[13:10] Warning against malaria.&nbsp;Anyway, back to the dinner K-ration. The first item&nbsp;that comes out of this includes yet more biscuits,&nbsp;though these are known as the K5 square, so&nbsp;at least we're getting some variation.
[13:22] Also,&nbsp;you'll note that there is a box inside of the&nbsp; outer box. It can either be just plain&nbsp;&nbsp; or some of them said breakfast unit, dinner unit,&nbsp;but they all had the letter on the bottom and&nbsp;they were all waxed.
[13:34] The outer box not waxed so they wouldn't stick together if they melted,&nbsp;&nbsp; but the inner box was waxed and sealed shut&nbsp; so that no liquid could theoretically get in.&nbsp;&nbsp; Anyway, after the biscuit, you've got a confection&nbsp; which sometimes was maltted milk dextrose tablets,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[13:50] The&nbsp;caramels in this case were produced by the Kroger&nbsp;Grocery and Baking Company which is still around.&nbsp;Go to Kroger's. And they taste like caramels,&nbsp;&nbsp; Then the last thing packed with&nbsp;the biscuits was lemon juice powder. And this&nbsp;&nbsp;
[14:08] people really complained about actually probably&nbsp; more than any other component because it was&nbsp;meant to be dissolved in water with sugar to make&nbsp;lemonade. But I guess the the amount of sugar that&nbsp;was given
[14:20] was the ratio was totally&nbsp;off. So it ended up just really being very sour.&nbsp;&nbsp; And it didn't help that it is synthetic lemon&nbsp; powder. It's not even real. So people said it&nbsp;doesn't actually taste like lemons. It tasted&nbsp;more like just battery acid- like it bit you.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[14:35] One soldier recalled, "We used K ration and&nbsp;lemon powder dissolved in buckets of water&nbsp;for scrubbing the floor when we were living in&nbsp;buildings, and it worked out exceptionally well,&nbsp;cutting dirt spots and more or less bleaching the&nbsp;wooden floors."
[14:48] Eventually, it was phased out in&nbsp;favor of orange-aid or a synthetic grape drink,&nbsp; and I've got the granulated&nbsp;sugar that was meant to be mixed with it,&nbsp;I should give it a shot.
[15:01] So some&nbsp;cold water and just add that&nbsp;&nbsp; synthetic powder. And then, like I said, we&nbsp; know how much sugar to add 'cus they boxed it up.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[15:13] I feel like that's a lot of sugar, but you know&nbsp;what? Maybe not. Bottoms up.
[15:25] Oh god. x_X I can't even drink a second drink of that.&nbsp; That's really sour. I don't like sour things.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[15:37] It doesn't taste- It tastes like- lemon. It tastes like if you took like, you know, the&nbsp; stuff that they clean a bathroom with, which is,&nbsp;&nbsp; I guess, why they used it as a cleaner. That is&nbsp; what it tastes like.
[15:53] Now, in&nbsp;addition to this horrible drink, dinner included&nbsp; the obligatory biscuits, camouflage can, this time&nbsp;filled with processed American cheese, chewing&nbsp;gum, cigarettes, and matches.
[16:06] And you'll note&nbsp;I'm not tasting what is in these cans, and&nbsp;that is because they are powdered.&nbsp;&nbsp; They're dehydrated. They're not actually the way&nbsp; that they were made during the war. And so,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[16:20] I'm just not going to eat them. You could&nbsp;fill them or add water and then reconstitute them,&nbsp;but again they're not really indicative of the&nbsp;original. And you can't really find exactly&nbsp;what the original was. You can go watch Steve&nbsp;1989 MRE
[16:35] That's what he does on his YouTube channel.&nbsp; But even then, when he gets to the K-rations,&nbsp;&nbsp; they're so old that usually these cans have&nbsp; deteriorated and there's nothing in there.
[16:47] And&nbsp;you know, he's not willing to completely poison&nbsp; himself. But wonderful channel to watch anyway.&nbsp;&nbsp; What I am going to try are these K5 biscuits,&nbsp; which supposedly tasted better than the K1 and K2.&nbsp;&nbsp; Definitely softer.
[17:02] Now, before we move on&nbsp;to supper, you'll note that these boxes have nice&nbsp;designs and and colors on them. And that was not&nbsp;always the case. For the majority of the war,&nbsp; they were just plain, you know, plain cardboard.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[17:18] But it was determined in 1943 that the packaging&nbsp; wasn't very inviting. So they decided to design&nbsp;the outer boxes more colorfully with designs. They were called morale boxes. And they went&nbsp;into production in May of 1944, just before the&nbsp;D-Day landings.
[17:34] was adopted in order to stimulate interest in&nbsp;the food and make it appear more attractive to&nbsp;the soldier... The designs are bold, masculine,&nbsp;and impersonal."
[17:47] Bold, masculine, and impersonal, that's husband material right there. But while&nbsp;they did look better and they were easier to&nbsp; distinguish from a distance which meal was which,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[18:00] they didn't actually change the food. And so,&nbsp; yes, the box was more appealing, but the inside&nbsp;was not. So, it didn't really change the way&nbsp;the soldiers felt about the food inside.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[18:14] There's only so much lipstick you can put on to gussy&nbsp; up a pig. And this turned out to not be enough.&nbsp;&nbsp; And now for our last gussied up pig, it is time&nbsp; for supper.
[18:26] Also, I feel like we don't use that&nbsp;word supper anymore very often. And I think it's&nbsp;interesting because my grandparents used it all&nbsp;the time. They actually did breakfast, then dinner&nbsp;was the main meal of the day, and then supper was&nbsp;in the evening.
[18:39] Whereas now, I think most people&nbsp;say breakfast, lunch, dinner. So, I'm curious if&nbsp;&nbsp; maybe it's a regional thing or if if you&nbsp;know of anyone who still uses the word supper.&nbsp;&nbsp; Leave me a note in the comments and where&nbsp;you're from 'cus that's what I'm actually curious&nbsp;about.
[18:55] So supper starts off with yet another can.&nbsp;This being beef and pork loaf. And this one says,&nbsp;"Eat cold or after heating by boiling can in water&nbsp;or after frying in its own fat with added biscuit&nbsp;crumbs."
[19:08] But there was another way to heat up your&nbsp;cans of food, and that was with explosives.&nbsp;&nbsp; During the Battle of Okinawa, Kenneth Long recalled that&nbsp;"Most of the guys had some knowledge of demolition&nbsp;and explosives as we were using blocks of TNT&nbsp;and composition C2 to seal caves.
[19:22] It wasn't long&nbsp;though, and we learned that these explosives&nbsp;served us well to heat our food, especially&nbsp;composition C2. This was a putty-like material&nbsp;that one could shape into any design and place&nbsp;under the can to be heated;
[19:34] Along with the canned meat, there were&nbsp;more biscuits, again, the K5 in this case. Then&nbsp;some bouillon powder, more cigarettes, more chewing&nbsp;gum, and then drumroll please
[19:46] So, last month I actually kicked&nbsp;off this World War II ration series with the&nbsp; D-ration. And that was an emergency chocolate bar&nbsp;&nbsp; made with chocolate and oat flour to keep it from&nbsp;melting.
[20:00] It was 4 ounces, and they had a smaller one,&nbsp;half the size that was put into the K-ration. Now,&nbsp;by the time these are around late 44, early 45,&nbsp;&nbsp; they had changed the recipe a bit. So, they were&nbsp; supposed to be more palatable than the actual&nbsp;D-ration.
[20:16] And like this one is Rockwood's&nbsp;sweet chocolate. So, they don't even call it the&nbsp;D-ration but I do want to try it. It's still&nbsp;the same shape as the D-ration, but you'll notice&nbsp;&nbsp; it has melted a bit, and that was part of&nbsp; the problem. They would- they would melt,
[20:31] because they didn't have as much oat&nbsp; flour in them. Let's give it a try. [chomp] Much closer to something that a person&nbsp; would want to eat. It's not as grainy.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[20:47] It's still very hard like the D-ration,&nbsp; but it's not as grainy as the D-ration. Pretty good. Now, the only other item that I&nbsp; won't be trying out for you here on camera is&nbsp;&nbsp;
[21:02] Now, this was&nbsp;actually one of the most coveted items along&nbsp;with the cigarettes and and the chocolate&nbsp;for the K-ration, but it was not included&nbsp;for the first several years, not until&nbsp;pretty close to the end of the war. So just&nbsp;&nbsp;
[21:16] think about that or actually maybe don't&nbsp; think too much about that but even the highly&nbsp;coveted toilet paper was not above scrutiny. "If&nbsp;there was one improvement that should have been&nbsp;made to the K-rations, it was that the toilet&nbsp;paper should have been waterproofed.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[21:30] Although this shortcoming was not life threatening, wet&nbsp;toilet paper did cause some irritating situations." And speaking of irritating situations, I think&nbsp; it's time I check in on my K1 defense biscuits.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[21:42] And here we are, the K1 defense biscuit,&nbsp; the backbone of the K-ration of World War II.&nbsp;&nbsp; So they're not perfect. They're definitely a&nbsp; little too big. And they definitely puffed up too&nbsp;much. I just made them too thick, but I&nbsp;was cutting them by hand, so I didn't expect them&nbsp;to be perfect,
[22:00] but the US Army absolutely would&nbsp;have. In the instructions that they gave to the manufacturers, &nbsp;&nbsp; they say "The product shall&nbsp;be uniformly well baked, of reasonably uniform size and thickness,&nbsp;with reasonably clean-cut&nbsp;edges."
[22:16] And I'm going to guess that these&nbsp;would not have been acceptable to the US Army.&nbsp;&nbsp; Especially when they stack up. Just&nbsp;not not working, but let's see how I did&nbsp;on the other prerequisite,
[22:31] which was to have a&nbsp;characteristically appetizing flavor. Here we go. [chomp] Nuh-uh.
[22:44] UNHhhh. I mean, are they terrible? No, they don't&nbsp;taste like bad. They just don't taste good.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[22:58] There ain't enough sugar in there&nbsp; for them to taste good. It tastes so-&nbsp;&nbsp; They actually taste- my&nbsp;mom used to when I was a little kid,&nbsp;my mom was on this kick and she would get&nbsp;this bread that was like super dense and super&nbsp;&nbsp;
[23:15] flavorless, but it was really healthy. It&nbsp;was child abuse, frankly. It was terrible.&nbsp;&nbsp; But this is what that reminds me&nbsp;of. Kind of like if you made a-&nbsp;
[23:28] a graham cracker or something like that, but&nbsp; softer. slightly softer and added absolutely&nbsp;no sugar. There is sugar in here, but so little&nbsp;it doesn't really matter.
[23:41] The thing is they&nbsp;say that this had a characteristically appealing&nbsp;flavor. No, it didn't. Or appetizing flavor.&nbsp;&nbsp; There are so many stories about how they did not&nbsp; soldiers did not like these.
[23:54] Especially because&nbsp;if you have one, maybe two, okay, that's fine.&nbsp;Dip it in some coffee or whatever. It's fine.&nbsp;&nbsp; But they were eating like 20 of these a day.&nbsp; This was the main component. This is&nbsp;&nbsp;
[24:06] where many if not most of their calories are coming&nbsp; from. So after a day or two or three,&nbsp;&nbsp; that's rough. And really the K-ration was meant to&nbsp; be eaten for no more than 3 days, but very often&nbsp;&nbsp;
[24:20] they were eaten for weeks, sometimes months at&nbsp; a time. And it was very often commented on that&nbsp;&nbsp; "In general, the men&nbsp;will not eat K rations after a few days.
[24:33] They will pick out the chocolate bar, drink the coffee, and&nbsp;eat the soda crackers if they are the salted type.&nbsp;&nbsp; They will usually eat the cheese for about a week,&nbsp; after which they get tired of it." But that's how&nbsp;actual soldiers felt about these biscuits. And&nbsp;frankly, that's how I feel about these biscuits.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[24:49] But if you watch the war propaganda from&nbsp;early on in the war, they thought much more&nbsp;highly of their biscuits. I found this&nbsp;great video about producing the K-ration,&nbsp;&nbsp; "The object&nbsp;of the K-ration is provide the soldier with&nbsp;food under emergency.
[25:07] Several recipes, for&nbsp;instance, were tried in picking a soybean biscuit.&nbsp;&nbsp; This biscuit seems to meet specifications.&nbsp; Pretty tasty biscuit. It's good eating." There's one more interesting little story I have&nbsp; about these biscuits or rather they call them&nbsp;crackers
[25:22] and it's probably more like this or the&nbsp;soda crackers that they would put in the boxes&nbsp;&nbsp; later on in the war which were slightly more&nbsp;palatable. But what's interesting is that&nbsp;the person eating these was not an American&nbsp;soldier
[25:37] but a German prisoner of war waiting&nbsp;to stand trial in Nuremberg. The story was told by&nbsp;the psychologist Gustave Gilbert as he observed war&nbsp;criminals like Rudolf Hess
[25:49] who claimed, " 'I got&nbsp;a headache from eating crackers again yesterday.'&nbsp;&nbsp; Here he pulled out a little cellophane wrapping&nbsp; of 10-in 1 ration crackers, and offered me one.&nbsp;&nbsp; 'Would you be good enough to eat this and tell&nbsp; me if it gives you a headache? And this too.'&nbsp;&nbsp;
[26:02] He then picked up a K-ration package of crackers&nbsp; and handed me one. 'Of&nbsp;course, it may be just accidental on account of my continuous stomach cramps.
[26:14] I wouldn't have given&nbsp;it any thought, but it happened twice.' " Absolutely&nbsp;not. You can just to see what it's like,&nbsp;but you can also get these replica K-rations&nbsp;online at a place called Hero Rations.
[26:31] I think that that wraps up the US rations. um&nbsp;&nbsp; At least for now, so I'll be moving on to another&nbsp;country.
[26:43] and I will&nbsp;see you next time on Tasting History.