hot sauce, and even in the most remote outposts it was available to kill, condition, and season anything from Cheerios to mashed potatoes to bananas.
My favorite meal was Buffalo Shrimp, a dish rejected by the Long John Silverâs chain as below its already low deep-fried-everything standard. Frozen hunks of batter, some even containing hints of shrimp pieces, were soaked in oil, fried, and then immersed in a viscous red sauce that burned the hell out of your tongue. The sensation was novel, a memory of actual food having an actual effect on your taste buds, and the fiery burps that followed allowed you to keep the dream alive for hours. Buffalo Shrimp usually appeared on alternate Sunday evenings. All of the food rotated on a schedule, and I worked very hard not to memorize it. Bad enough to have to eat bright yellow Chicken à la King. Worse to have to think about it in advance.
The DFAC tried to celebrate most major holidays, with special meals like steak (Wednesdayâs pot roast served horizontal). Best of all, twice a year, on the Armyâs June 14 birthday and on Super Bowl Monday (the game was live at 4:00 a.m. Monday owing to the time difference), soldiers were permitted one can of beer. This was a big, big deal. To get your can of beer, step one was to go to a room off the cafeteria, show your ID card, and have your name checked against a list of soldiers. The line was as long as the four hundred troops inhabiting the FOB. You then had to demonstrate that your weapon was safe and unloaded and place it in a holding rack. This seemed silly until you realized that most of the soldiers had not had any alcohol for months, and even this one beer was going to do some damage. An armed senior NCO with his game face on handed you your beer, which you were required to open in front of him (no hoarding allowed). You stoodâno chairs inside the roomâdrank your beer, and left. You couldnât trade, give away, or otherwise transfer your beer, and you couldnât drink it outside the room. I waited in line over an hour the first time to find that as a nonsoldier I was not on the list and thus I got no beer. For perhaps the first time in my life I was officially the most sober person in the room. The incident underscored our situation: if the occasional mortar rounds at night, IEDs on the roads, and sniper shots did not remind you your life was not in your control, the inability to secure a can of beer as an adult drove it home. It is always the little things.
On Thanksgiving, I participated in the military tradition of officers serving the troops, standing with the Commander and dishing out boiled-to-its-death corn from a can. The Commander ladled out brown sludge gravy, also from a can. The meal was a traditional Thanksgiving, with replicas of turkey, stuffing, sweet potatoes, and all the Norman Rockwell rest. We wore paper Pilgrim hats, as did the befuddled Sri Lankans who worked beside us. No one had explained to them what was going on, and they just did what they were told, like every other night. Many frozen turkeys were flown in and cooked to within an inch of liquefaction. Nobody seemed happy, but everyone did get a lot of food, though like our reports of success, much was ladled out while little was swallowed. The experience felt nothing like home, and I think everyone was glad when it turned to Friday.
Lunch the next day reverted to business as usual, with the featured item chicken-fried steak with gravy. The steak was a piece of old, tough beef breaded and deep-fried, then covered in grayish, glutinous gravy. The alternative selection was ravioli requiring no mastication to consume; you could suck it through a straw but wouldnât want to. To save time, many soldiers just carried it to the latrine and threw it in whole to save the trouble of processing it through their intestines. Then they ate Pop-Tarts and drank Red Bulls until no one could feel their limbs. What was the difference between
My favorite meal was Buffalo Shrimp, a dish rejected by the Long John Silverâs chain as below its already low deep-fried-everything standard. Frozen hunks of batter, some even containing hints of shrimp pieces, were soaked in oil, fried, and then immersed in a viscous red sauce that burned the hell out of your tongue. The sensation was novel, a memory of actual food having an actual effect on your taste buds, and the fiery burps that followed allowed you to keep the dream alive for hours. Buffalo Shrimp usually appeared on alternate Sunday evenings. All of the food rotated on a schedule, and I worked very hard not to memorize it. Bad enough to have to eat bright yellow Chicken à la King. Worse to have to think about it in advance.
The DFAC tried to celebrate most major holidays, with special meals like steak (Wednesdayâs pot roast served horizontal). Best of all, twice a year, on the Armyâs June 14 birthday and on Super Bowl Monday (the game was live at 4:00 a.m. Monday owing to the time difference), soldiers were permitted one can of beer. This was a big, big deal. To get your can of beer, step one was to go to a room off the cafeteria, show your ID card, and have your name checked against a list of soldiers. The line was as long as the four hundred troops inhabiting the FOB. You then had to demonstrate that your weapon was safe and unloaded and place it in a holding rack. This seemed silly until you realized that most of the soldiers had not had any alcohol for months, and even this one beer was going to do some damage. An armed senior NCO with his game face on handed you your beer, which you were required to open in front of him (no hoarding allowed). You stoodâno chairs inside the roomâdrank your beer, and left. You couldnât trade, give away, or otherwise transfer your beer, and you couldnât drink it outside the room. I waited in line over an hour the first time to find that as a nonsoldier I was not on the list and thus I got no beer. For perhaps the first time in my life I was officially the most sober person in the room. The incident underscored our situation: if the occasional mortar rounds at night, IEDs on the roads, and sniper shots did not remind you your life was not in your control, the inability to secure a can of beer as an adult drove it home. It is always the little things.
On Thanksgiving, I participated in the military tradition of officers serving the troops, standing with the Commander and dishing out boiled-to-its-death corn from a can. The Commander ladled out brown sludge gravy, also from a can. The meal was a traditional Thanksgiving, with replicas of turkey, stuffing, sweet potatoes, and all the Norman Rockwell rest. We wore paper Pilgrim hats, as did the befuddled Sri Lankans who worked beside us. No one had explained to them what was going on, and they just did what they were told, like every other night. Many frozen turkeys were flown in and cooked to within an inch of liquefaction. Nobody seemed happy, but everyone did get a lot of food, though like our reports of success, much was ladled out while little was swallowed. The experience felt nothing like home, and I think everyone was glad when it turned to Friday.
Lunch the next day reverted to business as usual, with the featured item chicken-fried steak with gravy. The steak was a piece of old, tough beef breaded and deep-fried, then covered in grayish, glutinous gravy. The alternative selection was ravioli requiring no mastication to consume; you could suck it through a straw but wouldnât want to. To save time, many soldiers just carried it to the latrine and threw it in whole to save the trouble of processing it through their intestines. Then they ate Pop-Tarts and drank Red Bulls until no one could feel their limbs. What was the difference between
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