A new food for the Australian Army in battle conditions.

[101st Airborne]

Vitamin-packed dark chocolate that won't melt in the heat of battle and will last for years is being developed for Australian soldiers.

Scientists from the Defence Science and Technology Organisation (DSTO) at Scottsdale in Tasmania are working on a new super chocolate for army ration packs.

"From a nutritionist's point of view we would love to give the soldiers a fresh meal every day," DSTO spokeswoman Helen Ward said.

"But logistics don't always allow that and we don't want our soldiers to die of malnutrition when they are in a foxhole feeling hungry."

Ms Ward said the idea of supplying troops with chocolate had psychological and physiological advantages.

"We could just give them a pill containing the same vitamins, but it would be nothing like giving them real food.

"Chocolate has long been regarded as a treat, something to look forward to, and something that would provide a mental and physical boost.

"That's why this is being developed to withstand the elements."

DSTO food technologist Dr Lan Bui, who is based at Scottsdale, said the new product is more granular and firmer but the flavour is still appealing.

"DSTO is looking at product reformulation, including new fat compounds, to improve texture and flavour, without affecting the melting point," Dr Bui said.

Normal chocolate melts at about 25-30 degrees celsius, but she said the new version will be expected to maintain its uniformity for extended periods at over 49 degrees celsius.

Scientists are working with food experts on coating vitamins to keep out humidity, moisture and oxygen, while allowing them to be slowly released into the body.

The team also is working on a milk chocolate variety and developing less permeable packaging to extend shelf life.


?AAP 2007

[Collo]

The choc now could withstand a nuclear blast. Solid stuff.

[101st Airborne]

Yes and it's for any time of day, so it's called "Choc around the clock".

[Collo]

I use to chuck the blocks into my brew, still didn't break down the ruddy thing.

[101st Airborne]

I think I see this as being very beneficial to an army unit pinned down without rations and it's obvious advantages over an enemy force experiencing similar problems.
Take the Kokoda situation in the last war. The Japanese were starving to death towards the end. Our forces weren't much better off, but with air superiority, were kept going with supply drops from Dakotas. Such a supplementary food would have helped immensely between drops.
Fortunately the Japanese didn't have anything of this modern nature.
The key word here is nutrition. Not only just food, but food with vitamins for the general well being of the soldiers.
Scientific studies have shown that even eyesight, not to mention morale is severely affected by lack of certain foods.

[Collo]

Yep, they taste completely foul (except the Beef Ka Si Ming found mainly in RP class B mixed with curry powder is alright) however they are good for nutrition which one can not ignore.

[Elwingflys]

Well to come up with food that can withstand all the conditions and last at least a decade that pretty much leaves you with multi flavored bricks. Poor guys.

[Gun Bunny]

Thats all well and good, but when are they going to start putting chocolate into the rat packs that doesnt make you poo?

And FYI, the chocolates solidity is nothing, NOTHING, compared to that bonlax "cheese".

Note: it is yet to be proven to me that the 'cheese' is in fact a dairy product and not just yellow plastic in a green tin.
Posted on: 21-05-2007, 20:55:30Furthermore, has anyone ever tried the chocolate after its been sitting under your bed for a couple of months? (I have a LOT of rations btw). Filthy white powder. The m&ms get a wierd taste when theyre a few months old too.

[Elwingflys]

ROTFLMAO
No but I imagine it is like the candy in the convenience store that hasn't been rotated for a year. YUCK!

[Collo]

Arh That very powdery taste which one needs an entire camal pack to get rid of the taste. When I was a Pooka, my SeCo said "they are a great quality product that are fine in all ways, just don't look at the expiry date".

I reckon once all your ammo runs out, the butt of the rifle cracks after bashing the enemy, your "combat knife" becomes blunt from use; you can chuck the choc bars at enemy or leave it out form the try and eat it, they are sure to keel over and die or at least crack their jaws.

I like what the US call MREs', Meals Rejected by Ethiopians.

[Gun Bunny]

ahhh yes the ol' "combat knife". Even the sharpest bayo... I mean "combat Knife" can do little against the dreaded tin of cheese. I remember one recruit course field phase someone spread the rumour that the CSM loved the tins of cheese. Long story short he ended up leaving with a field pack and 2 minimi pouches of cheese. He had enough that he built walls at the open ends of his hutchie.

He, like everyone else, cant stand the cheese.

[Elwingflys]

See? It is good for something. Great insulation and building material.

When I was a kid I used to go to a camp in the summer that got some of there food supplies from a closed military base. When I made counselor I found out about the peanut butter when raiding the kitchen at night. All the oil is removed and will bend or break a dinner knife if you are just trying to snitch a little bit because they are out of the reconstituted. LOL

[Collo]

That's a lot of cheese.

Once we used the left over cheese tins as dummy grenades to practice with.   

So these things have some uses I guess.

[Gun Bunny]

but not as a foodstuff

[Collo]

So true, sp very true.

[Elwingflys]

I always heard an army marches on it's stomach. To bad the guys that make the rats never heard that. LOL

[Collo]

That's gold Elfie.

On a similar

ELEANOR HALL: The Australian Army has responded to the death of a teenage boy by banning the use of ration packs from all its cadet camps across the country.

Nathan Francis died after apparently collapsing from a peanut allergy on a school cadet camp in Victoria earlier this year.

And questions are now being asked about why has it taken so long to identify the risk posed by the ration packs and why they haven't also been banned for soldiers on the battlefield.

In Melbourne, Jane Cowan reports.

JANE COWAN: Nathan Francis was 13-years-old when he died in March on an army cadet camp in Victoria's Wombat State Forest.

Authorities still haven't said what triggered the allergic reaction but The World Today understands the boy went into anaphylactic shock after eating a satay sauce contained within an army ration pack.

By the time he was flown to hospital in Melbourne, it was too late.

Now the army has posted an urgent message on its cadet website, banning the use of its ration packs on all cadet camps.

NEIL JAMES: Look, it's just a simple occupational health and safety issue.

JANE COWAN: Neil James is the Executive Director of the Australia Defence Association.

NEIL JAMES: The problem with school cadets is that nearly all school cadets haven't been through a military medical and you don't know who's got a peanut allergy or not. So, given the increasing prevalence of peanut allergies, the only solution to it is not give Defence Force ration packs to school cadets.

JANE COWAN: If it's such a simple solution why hasn't it happened until now?

NEIL JAMES: Well, probably because the problem's never developed up until now. I mean, peanut allergies are reasonably unheard of until a few years ago and they're now becoming more prevalent for reasons that aren't entirely clear. I mean, you can't really blame any organisation for this.

MARIA SAID: Peanut is a high-risk food and if you're in a bush situation with very limited help then why is it that a satay beef is on a school cadet camp.

JANE COWAN: Maria Said is the President of Anaphylaxis Australia.

She says ration packs containing peanuts should never have been on a cadet camp in the first place.

MARIA SAID: What I'm say is that, you know, remove nuts completely from ration packs for schools, for children, for young people, and if you're going to have them for your defence forces then make sure that they are, if they're not visible to the person as being nuts, if it's hidden in a food as such, make sure that that food has a neon light on it that says "this contains peanuts" because I'm sure there are adults in the army that have food allergy as well.

JANE COWAN: But that's unlikely, if you ask the Defence Force.

A spokeswoman told The World Today each case is assessed individually but people with life threatening allergies can be excluded from joining the Defence Forces.

The Defence Association's Neil James is more categorical. He says no one in the Defence Force would have a severe peanut allergy.

NEIL JAMES: Everyone in the Defence Force has been through a full medical and they know that they don't have peanut allergy, because obviously you cannot have a peanut allergy and serve in the Defence Force.

In simple terms, you can't serve in the Defence Force if you've got something that causes you to have a medical problem, in conditions that you can't control. So if you're sending members of the Defence Force out onto battlefields somewhere and you can't guarantee there won't be peanut-based products there, so therefore obviously you don't risk people.

I mean, it's the same with any disease that affects people and excludes them from the Defence Force, like tuberculosis or leprosy or AIDS or anything, even to an extent, asthma, where you can't actually control the conditions where people will have to fight.

JANE COWAN: And so, while he welcomes the move to ban the ration packs from cadet camps, Neil James says there's no need to take peanuts out of ration packs issued within the army more broadly.

NEIL JAMES: The problem with taking the peanuts out ration packs you know, I mean, it's a high-energy food, the ration packs are meant to sustain people in high-energy activities, such as combat and battle.

I mean, you're not going to change the diet that we feed our service personnel in order for them to fight efficiently just because a very, very small minority of people may have a peanut allergy.

I mean, that would simply be throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

JANE COWAN: The World Today has repeatedly requested interviews with the Commander of the Army Cadets, Brigadier Andrew Murdoch.

So far he's been unavailable.

ELEANOR HALL: Jane Cowan in Melbourne with that report.

[Gun Bunny]

What a stupid idea, taking the peanuts out of CRPs. ADF CRPs are not made for civvies. If this kind of thing happens, then the cadets should have just supplied their own food all along.

The main question though is why didnt the First Aid Officer know that the kid had an allergy? Was it not on his NOK?

Also, not to sound rude, in the fact that a young lad has died, but who, let alone someone with a peanut allergy, doesn't know what satay is!?! The very word satay (Sate) is Malaysian for peanut. The mind boggles at the stupidity of the situation.

Furthermore, they can't take away the satay chicken. That's one of my favourite main meals! I think its in the C pack...

RSM-F

[Collo]

Yep.

When I was a cadet we use to have both. Rat Packs I believed added to the whole bush experience.

This is an isolated event and I believe falls at the feet of the Cadets' instructors and not the CRPs'.

Back when I pretended, we had to fill a Parent Consent Form for everything we did, this clearly included stating all allergies that the member had. This cadet has either failed to fill this section out correctly or the Staff of his unit failed in their duty of care to identify the allergy and organize suitable supplement for the cadet.

[Gun Bunny]

That's right. I've been told the directive came right from the CDF. I have also been informed this is because the Commander of Cadets doesn't have the power to issue such a directive. Another reason it took so long was because CDF had no idea the incident happened but I'm told he hit the roof when he was informed.

[Collo]

This is sad, just sad. A good looks should be taken at the Staff and the information the Cadet supplied to them. This whole business could have been avoided simply by someone opening their mouth and people have a little bit of knowledge. Just sad.


 

[Elwingflys]

Over here if anything might have come into contact with a peanut...however remote the chance...it has to have a warning. Even restaurants have to have it someplace.

I never heard of peanut allergies when I was a kid. Just the last few decades more and more. Same with other allergies. Either they have gotten a lot better at figuring out what the allergies are or all the weird chems and stuff we are subject to are making us more sensitive to allergies. I am getting allergies I never had when I was younger.

Things like this are so sad and a lot of folks just blow you off when you say you are allergic to something.

[Collo]

I find that most allergies are enviromentally based. My father (who is an American by brith) grew up in country NSW. His father (Aussie and my Grandmother American) was a coal minner. They smoked, lived in an lead based paint house etc. My father grew up in an enviroment like so many others from his generation that pushed their immune system. It gave their bodies the health work out that is not present in modern day society.

Today we see not only children but adults too living in a rather "clean" enviroment. By this I refer to, the days of the coal fire stove, the smoke filed houses etc are all but gone. I believe that when we first enter the world these days our immune system is set to a lower standard if you will than those of the dating back past the 1940/50s'.

Refering back to the Cadet who passed away. As sad as that is, both he and the staff of his unti failed to take the right steps in preventing such an outcome.

[Elwingflys]

In a way you could be right. All the additives and such that were not present then is a difference. Is food really meant to last for years?

[Collo]

Well those who put the CRPs together seem to thinks so,