The US military invests a lot of R&D in their MREs, and they have improved monotonically over the decades. Even a few decades ago they were actually pretty dece

The US military invests a lot of R&D in their MREs, and they have improved monotonically over the decades. Even a few decades ago they were actually pretty decent, aside from a couple famous outliers. A couple of the meals invariably are a total miss, and everyone avoids them, but that feedback gets back to the R&D center and they try something different. Having the best possible food in the field, under the circumstances, is viewed as critical for morale as a matter of doctrine by the US military and they invest a lot in it. Soldiers, in turn, are pretty creative at getting the most out of the MRE contents. In some parts of the world, MREs are recognized as currency.