Complaining about the grub in orbit is a timeless - and understandable - tradition among astronauts. Contraband corned beefīut that still wasn’t enough for some astronauts. And NASA stepped up its freeze-dried foods by putting them in plastic containers that made it easier for astronauts to turn them into something palatable, like a shrimp cocktail or chicken and veggies. The cubes were covered in gelatin to stop crumbs. Gemini astronauts got to eat solid-ish food. It wasn’t until NASA advanced to the Gemini program and was prepping for the Moon that the space agency finally heeded astronauts’ complaints. Other menu options included freeze-dried powders and bite-sized cubes. Throughout the Mercury program - NASA’s early missions exploring orbital spaceflight - astronauts had to get used to sucking food from tubes. But that wasn’t the end of eating foods that looked more like toothpaste. Would Glenn be able to swallow and digest food? Fortunately, his body handled the space meal just fine. No one knew how the body would react to eating in a zero-gravity environment. He was also issued pureed beef and vegetables in a tube, which now belongs to the National Air and Space Museum.Īt the time, scientists had bigger concerns than pleasing astronaut taste buds. Glenn was served up a tube of applesauce, plus some sugar tablets that he dissolved in water. Glenn’s meal selection wasn’t any better than Gagarin’s, but at least NASA packed him a straw. (Astronaut Alan Shepard flew to space first, but his 15-minute suborbital flight was so short he didn’t eat.) The following year, astronaut John Glenn became the first American to orbit Earth. And for dessert? Mission planners were kind enough to include a tube of chocolate sauce. To eat it, he simply squeezed the food directly into his mouth. Gagarin’s crumb-free meal featured two portions of pureed meat, stored neatly in toothpaste-tube-like containers. He also was the first person to eat in space. In 1961, Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin became the first human to orbit Earth. You can’t have crunchy food on the International Space Station, she explained to The Associated Press the crumbs might be hazardous to equipment. When NASA astronaut Christina Koch returned from her record-breaking 328-day spaceflight earlier this month - the longest ever for a female astronaut - she was desperate for chips and salsa. And while astronaut food has slowly improved, modern spacefarers still come home pining for their favorite dish - and complaining about the grub in orbit. The first meals in space were rather revolting affairs. But humanity might have reconsidered those daydreams if they knew what astronauts had to eat. Add a little hot water and they can barely believe that they are actually hundreds of miles above the Earth and not in their own kitchens.The dawn of the Space Age left an entire generation fantasizing about becoming astronauts, floating free above Earth’s surface with a window directly to the stars. They are not eating mysterious concoctions that don’t even resemble food, but a variety of meals prepared on Earth. Almost all foods can be freeze dried, giving astronauts an astonishing array of food items to choose from. In fact, every manned mission ever launched by NASA has carried some freeze-dried food.įreeze-dried food is perfect for space since it is lightweight, resistant to spoilage, high in nutrition, easy to prepare, and loaded with flavor. The first meal ever eaten on the surface of the moon, by Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin, included freeze-dried bacon and peaches. While in all likelihood freeze-dried ice cream never actually made it to space, NASA has extensively used the process of freeze drying to make space mission meals. Most likely, the first thing your average person thinks of if you mention freeze-dried food is astronaut ice cream.
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