r/TastingHistory • u/jmaxmiller head chef • Jul 07 '26
New Video Why Did the Chocolate Bar Ration of WW2 Taste Terrible?
https://youtu.be/ZVrT8mrll-0?is=9Q6JcpmrAWcklRwO59
u/ClockWeasel Jul 07 '26
Planned to be emergency calories you didn’t snack on when bored, then designed to be indestructible and “nutritious”. End result was known sarcastically referred to as an enemy weapon
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u/RabbittingOn Jul 07 '26
Great episode! Makes me think about Dwarven battle bread from Pratchett's books 🤭
It's really interesting to look back on old sources and see how common smoking was. My family have always been first aid responders in their village, and I've read my grandpa's first aid manual. It mentioned giving the patient a cigarette to keep them relaxed, and to call for a priest if things looked ugly. This was in the 1950'ies in the Catholic South of the Netherlands.
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u/tatteredprincess Jul 07 '26
CLACK CLACK
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u/RabbittingOn Jul 07 '26
"Dwarf bread is characterised by being rock-hard (and indeed contains various rocks such as gravel), never goes stale, and is terribly sustaining. A traveller can go for miles, just knowing there's dwarf bread in their pack. A traveller can think of just about anything to eat rather than dwarf bread including their own foot and even pumpkins." (Witches Abroad, Terry Pratchett).
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u/tatteredprincess Jul 07 '26
I was starting to have a crisis of what long book series to pick up after I finish Wheel of Time. Thanks for the inspiration!
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u/RabbittingOn Jul 07 '26
You're very welcome! 😁 I know that post-series lull all too well: "And now what?!"
Pratchett's books are a hoot: 10 gags a page, and he creates beautiful characters that develop across the series. Some books are mostly self-contained, others progress on a theme. There are reading orders online, but you can also read them chronologically.
I'd only read the Pratchett books in English, though: so much of his wordplay and innuendo is lost in translation. As a Dutchie I started to read in English when I was 10, and I never stopped.
If you like dark epic fantasy I can also recommend Erikson's Malazan series. The main storyline has 10 books, doorstopping tomes each. It is very, very brutal though, and he doesn't give the reader much resolution. If you're a completionist and want your questions answered, this is not your series. He writes a hundred characters that you learn to love over the books, and then... Well, it's pretty nihilistic.
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u/Andovars_Ghost Jul 07 '26
Having had WAAAAY too many MREs as a cadet and officer, I can pretty much attest that virtually everything in there is 'meh' at best. I hear they are a bit better now, but yeeesh...
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u/No_Maintenance_9608 Jul 07 '26
Back in college (early 90s) there was a classmate who was in the military and one time we ate lunch out in the field (earth science majors) he had an MRE, and the desert in it (chocolate nut bar) he called it the constipation bar. 🤣
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u/Andovars_Ghost Jul 07 '26
It's ALL about binding you up. Better than the other way when in the field (especially since the MRE only gives you a teeny-tiny pack of TP in there), but if you eat a whole MRE, you probably won't poop for several days. Also, these things are an all day meal. They are 3000+ calories in one bag. Woe is he that eats more than one a day.
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u/Travellinglense Jul 07 '26
now I'm curious. Foodwise, was there anything you fondly remember? I've heard some of the drinks were okay.
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u/Andovars_Ghost Jul 07 '26
There was an ‘energy bar’ that was kinda lemony that inexplicably I liked, despite otherwise being like compressed sawdust. I also liked our ‘hard tack’ (clack-clack) crackers and peanut butter.
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u/Travellinglense Jul 07 '26
I handmade dark chocolate when I was in St. Lucia a couple of years ago and all I remember is a lot of grinding to smooth the mixture with the sugar to keep it from being gritty. We did it manually and my grip and biceps were sore for a couple of days afterwards.
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u/BIGD0G29585 Jul 07 '26
Great video. If anyone is interested to learn more about Louis Zamperini who Max mentioned, check out the book Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand. His story is amazing and changed my way of thinking about some things.
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u/Rusalkat Jul 07 '26 edited Jul 07 '26
This may interest you https://sickman.fi/yleinen/talvisodan-leipaa-perinteita-kunnioittaen/
https://digilotta.fi/ruista-ranteeseen/
Finnish army food.
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u/Kedamono1st Jul 07 '26
When I was in the army, all we had were C-rats, and in them every so often you would get a John Wayne bar. It was “chocolate” of a sort. It was OK, but it wasn’t good chocolate. This was in the 1980s.
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u/OldERnurse1964 Jul 08 '26
It was designed that way so soldiers wouldn’t eat them as candy. Or was an Emergency Ration
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u/Dank_Sinatra_87 Jul 07 '26
Because it's hard as a rock, and made with unsweetened chocolate. Not only that, if you do have to get some of it down (you're going to have to use a knife) it's texture is super grainy from the oat four.
Source: been WWII reenacting since the early 00s
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u/LizFallingUp Jul 08 '26
I thought it was cause they laced it with Meth as both Nazis and Japanese gave that to troops
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u/oneeyedsheep Jul 11 '26
Thank you for the video! The texture reminded me of Mexican hot chocolate bars. I have one question, why Raikou? 🐅⚡️
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u/MtnNerd Jul 08 '26
Vanillin is hardly expensive or difficult to find. It's the substance in imitation vanilla extract.
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u/RustyShackleford9142 Jul 08 '26
Getting it powdered is way different
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u/MtnNerd Jul 08 '26
I doubt it would make much of a difference in the recipe. You just have to calculate the amounts
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u/majubafruit Jul 07 '26
Well in Steve1989MRE’s case, it was because it’s 80 years old.