K ration
- noun
- /keɪ ˈræʃən/
- Archaic
:
ración K
- After several days in the camp, we finally had access to K rations to sustain us.
- eat K rations
Examples
-
"This is quite an outfit you've got here," Kastanas said as they waited for their K rations to heat in the fire.
Fiction book (1990) -
Two containers of K rations!
-
You gave him the last of that K ration, remember?
-
Two containers of K rations!
-
Those things came in the packages of K rations.
-
Have you ever tasted K ration?
-
We gave him a few K rations, and he was very thankful, bowing and saying 'Thank you' in English, as though he was getting the best treatment he had ever received.
Fiction book (1990) -
Then BARC research shifted from K rations to turkey holiday dinners.
Academic text (2001) -
During the war, soldiers relied heavily on K rations for their meals in the field.
-
The unsettling taste of the K ration made him long for a home-cooked meal.
Synonyms
106
4.2
A fixed amount of food or other supplies given to each person during a shortage such as war
2
4.9
A packed meal that soldiers eat during military operations
A canned meal given to American soldiers during wars
Surface Forms
Morphology
K + ration
The constituent 'ration' clearly signals an allotted food/supply portion, so a B1 learner would likely infer that 'K ration' names a type or variety of ration. However, the 'K' element is an arbitrary letter/code with no independent lexical meaning and does not convey the specific historical sense (a small WWII emergency package), so the full, specific meaning is not predictable without prior exposure.
Etymology
K ration may come from the name of a U.S. food scientist, Ancel Keys, whose name gave the letter K to a small wartime food pack. These were simple, ready-to-eat 'emergency food' soldiers carried on the move, so today K ration means a small pack of emergency food.