Photographer transforms food from combat ration packs into fine dining masterpieces

Glutinous rice balls with peanuts placed on hardtacks, with burnt aromatic leaves. Photo: John Heng (Ng Eng Hen/Facebook)
Glutinous rice balls with peanuts placed on hardtacks, with burnt aromatic leaves. Photo: John Heng (Ng Eng Hen/Facebook)

Combat rations, ugh. They’re no culinary masterpiece for sure, but they’re certainly there for you when you need them the most. At least, for Singapore’s national servicemen.

But one photographer saw more potential in them than the average citizen. As a personal homage to NS50 — a campaign that commemorates more than one million conscripts of Singapore’s compulsory National Service ever since it began in 1967 — 38-year-old photographer John Heng and his team transformed ordinary-looking food from the Singapore Armed Forces’ ration packs into beautifully styled plates worthy of any fine dining restaurant.

Items in the ration pack. Photo: John Heng (Ng Eng Hen/Facebook)

Some of the dishes included chicken rice, sweet potato soup, and glutinous rice — and the series of shots was so impressive and unrecognizable that Defence Minister Ng Eng Hen shared it on Facebook yesterday.

Check ’em out below.

The sweet potato soup with barley dessert pack transformed into a quenelle, drizzled with milk powder sieved from the plain cereal drink mix. Photo: John Heng (Ng Eng Hen/Facebook)
Chicken rice with mushroom crafted into a popsicle and dusted with ice lemon tea powder. Photo: John Heng (Ng Eng Hen/Facebook)
Keropok re-hydrated, blended, and baked into thin wafers, paired with Makhani bean stew and shredded chicken. Photo: John Heng (Ng Eng Hen/Facebook)
Packs of reduced chocolate cereal mix and apricot fruit bar dusted with the crumbs of oat biscuits. Photo: John Heng (Ng Eng Hen/Facebook)

Whaddya think — worthy of Gordon Ramsay’s approval?



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