NEW ARMY RATION.

Auckland Star, Volume LXXI, Issue 165, 13 July 1940, Page 17

NEW ARMY RATION.

U.S. CANNED FOOD.

BRITISH TO TEST IT.

British "Tommies" will be eating a new emergency ration developed by experts of the United States Army— and so will 63,000 American soldiers, says an American writer. The British Government, it is learned, has placed an initial order with an Indianapolis firm for a consignment of this new canned food. The United States Army will give "field ration, typo C," a two-day tryout during big manoeuvres in Texas. The ration, designed for a possible three-day emergency, is packed in twin tin cans, each with its key opener. Each man will carry one 15-ounce can of precooked meat and beans, one of beef stew, one of meat and vegetable hash, and three companion cans, each of which contains six ounces of crackers, one ounce of sugar, and three-quarters of an ounce of pulverised coffee, soluble even in cold water. The new ration costs 70 cents a day (as against the present daily ration allowance of 40£ cents), but the price is expected to be reduced by quantitv production. The Army also is experimenting with a" super-emergency ration—a hard bar composed of chocolate, milk, soya bean meal, cocoa butter and other ingredients. Major Paul P. Logan, an instructor at the Army Industrial College, who holds the patent, made its taste such that men will not be tempted to eat it as a sweet. In dire necessity, a man taking three four-ounce bars a day could be sustained in the field for three or four days. The new emergency rations are considered a big improvement, both in taste and food value, over the old bully beef and hardtack.