In my childhood my father would take me once a year to the "open days" of the German army garrison in the next larger town. It was always fun for a kid, because you could see live helicopters, tanks and all kinds of weird equipment (like a automated bridge building tank).
For my father, who had to spend two years of then compulsory army service, it was all about memories - the good and the bad.
He was always excited about the food you could have there - actually every year the same pea soup with sausage. And of course we always took one or two EPa's (the German MRE) home, for nostalgic purposes. I can't say it was a memorable meal tastewise. Basically canned food, together with a array of butter, charcuteries and jams for the dried bread in the pack. My highlight was the little dry-fuel burner that was included and I liked to have the meal prepared outside on the terrace, which resulted usually in a more cold-and-burned pasta in tomato sauce. But it was a bit of an adventure and I liked it.
When I checked the Wikipedia entry on the German MRE's today (thanks) memories came back and funny enough, not much seems to have changed in the last 30 years, when it comes to the nutrition of the German armed forces (German "Einmannpackung" at Wikipedia). I thus agree to your conclusion "not bad at all", but partially out of sentimental reasons ...
