They might not have been 50 years old. C-rations were still being issued in 1980 and were available through civilian shops years after that.

Actually I always liked C-rations. They were never a culinary delight, and some dishes were far less delightful than others (They didn't label them Beans and MFers without good reason), but most were bordering on moderately good and all were eatable if you were hungry. Of course a steady diet of anything tends to lead to a certain level of contempt.

I once worked on a ship that had been stocked for a large celebration that never came. The ship had more steak and lobster than you could shake a stick at. Trying to get rid of it they kept dropping the price. To the point it was $1 for all-you-can-eat. So people dug in. A week later people were bloated on surf-n-turf and couldn't stand to look at it. People started ordering oatmeal, scrambled eggs and BLTs just to have a change of pace. Irony being that those were the same things they complained about before the surf-n-turf was offered.

Nothing wrong with MREs. They are better than the old C-rations. They always go down, stay down and cooperate with the digestive system. I have never had a hint of a problem with them. Of course, some people aren't happy if they aren't complaining.

Bottom line is, in this context, we are talking about survival food. MREs are healthy and easy to work with. If they don't appeal to you I suspect your just not hungry. In which case you shouldn't be eating anyway.