You've got to be joking. Second time through that $hit hole and it's still hard to find something edible. The BK and Pizza Inn are the only thing that saved me on some days.
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What do you think about Navy food?
- Thread starter JoeLight
- Start date
been a long time since you've eaten on a boat that's been out to sea for awhile?
My experience with USA DFACs echoes that of others; they were far better than the food on USS BOAT.
That said, I think a lot of the fault lies in how the messes are manned and supplied. Ships have a few CSs overseeing a bunch of mess cranks whose job is to essentially reheat the prepared and prepackaged food that comes onboard. The building blocks of most boat meals are only a few steps above MREs. Very rarely is there any prep work done. In the cases that the CSs are actually allowed to cook, such as the occasional cookies or bread from scratch or eggs to order, the result is usually pretty good. The CSs on my last ship would occasionally make some damn good cookies (chocolate chip of course) and biscuits that I would make entire meals out of. They knew my love for them and would make sure some would make it up to PriFly.
While I don't have any real experience with ship food, I will say that the CS in charge matters. I am a good cook; I won't win any awards but I can make many things that taste pretty darn good. However, when PenguinGuy was on his first ship, there was a CS3 (who later became CS2) that was amazing. On his own dime he would go out and get spices and seasonings to use. I always knew when he was assigned to the wardroom because suddenly PenguinGuy would have to 'work late' and it's ok, he'll grab dinner on the ship. Seriously, he would skip out on home cooked meals for stuff this CS made. Said CS eventually got out of the Navy and later appeared on Guys Grocery Games.
Bottom line: there is some real talent in the Navy but it is rarely utilized properly.
Bottom line: there is some real talent in the Navy but it is rarely utilized properly.
My last boat meal, other than a box lunch off of a USNS a few months ago, was while on CCDG-5 staff. That was 1992-ish. The flag mess was a bit better than the ship's mess.
BTW, that photo from the previous post? That is an actual picture of yesterday's lunch. That reheated "stuff" is served every single day at Buehring. We do have produce daily, but it isn't ever really fresh. You're lucky if there is one leaf in a head of lettuce that has a greenish tint. The rest looks like Styrofoam.
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Same deployment, our Wardroom 3 CSs decided to improvise on Pizza Day and make calzones that were actually pretty dang tasty; until their CSC found out and they got yelled at for providing a better product than was intended to be served. Not a calzone to be seen on USS Nimitz after that.
Steak and lobster every Friday at LSA-6 chow hall at Bastion. Sorta
Interesting to hear all your experiences. Thanks for the pics 2!
Is this also accurate?
That's an old wives tale. Steak and lobster happens pretty normally. Although it's more like leather cow ass and steamed ocean la-cocka-roacha. I usually stick to the chicken/whatever other option on steak and lobster night.
exNavyOffRec
Well-Known Member
If the CS knows how to cook it the lobster can be pretty good, if not we used it as gasket material in the engineroom
By "sorta" I meant Lake Kajaki lobster and 1/4 in thick canners ribeye
I'm not joking. We loved Buehring. You have that custom line, the fast food line, the main meal line... it was nice compared to our ship. The banana milk and chocolate milk was good, there was always ice cream. We routinely ran out of milk, occasionally ran out of water even to drink, ice machines were down 25% of the time, so you can see how Buehring was a step up. I am not joking when I say most guys in my squadron were happy to get a week off the boat and at Buehring. I remember a few Marines came and joined us one night and one asked "so sirs, how'd ya'll get assigned to this shithole? We are in trouble for messing up x, y, and z and our company commander thought a field exercise out here would serve us right." A guy in my squadron said: "this is like a vacation for us compared to USS Boat." He was met with agreement.
Keep in mind, it's all through rose colored glasses. A week in Buehring also meant a week away from the ground job, wifi, a USO where you could skype home, etc.
At the risk of @Gonzo08 and I hijacking the thread to publicly swap sea stories we both experienced . . . (too late!
)It may be an old wives' tale, but it was cynically funny when the whole boat got steak and lobster mid-deployment, and those rumors started flying. Apparently, Supply just had money to burn, and that's how they burned it. No other reason. But you couldn't convince the bluejackets it wasn't a cursed meal.
Eventually, the Admiral personally made a 1MC announcement, words to the effect of "STFU with your bullshit rumors. No one's told me we're being extended. If I find out we are, I'll be back here on the 1MC telling you as soon as I find out. Now stop looking a damned gift horse in the mouth!"
Naturally, a few weeks later, we got extended.
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Same thing when we suddenly had an ice cream night on the frigate as we were leaving station for home, after months and months of no ice cream at all. Rumors started flying. Captain went on the 1MC to debunk the rumors. She had literally just put down the microphone when DESRON calls the ship and turns us around and sends us back to station. She came down to the wardroom with a sort of dazed look: "They're never going to believe one goddamned word I say ever again."
exNavyOffRec
Well-Known Member
At the risk of @Gonzo08 and I hijacking the thread to publicly swap sea stories we both experienced . . . (too late!
It may be an old wives' tale, but it was cynically funny when the whole boat got steak and lobster mid-deployment, and those rumors started flying. Apparently, Supply just had money to burn, and that's how they burned it. No other reason. But you couldn't convince the bluejackets it wasn't a cursed meal.
Eventually, the Admiral personally made a 1MC announcement, words to the effect of "STFU with your bullshit rumors. No one's told me we're being extended. If I find out we are, I'll be back here on the 1MC telling you as soon as I find out. Now stop looking a damned gift horse in the mouth!"
Naturally, a few weeks later, we got extended.
so 20+ years in, 7 deployments, and I was never extended, pretty much anytime we had lobster or ice cream, or decent food the last half of deployment the rumors went nuts.