Familiar flavours

The progress and processes in the domain of space food offer astronauts some home comforts

- ABHINAV SINGH

FORMULA DIETS WOULD be "extremely desirable" as space food. This is what the Man in Space Committee of the now-defunct Space Science Board of the US concluded in 1963 after studying the topic of 'nutrition and feeding problems. "In many parts of the world, the people subsist on a monotonous diet... with no apparent ill effects," the committee said. "Since highly motivated individuals are chosen for... space flights, it is unlikely that they would object to the monotony of a formula diet...." The committee's idea of formula diet had obviously not found takers, because Project Gemini (first flight: 1964) had, according to a NASA document, grape and orange drinks, cinnamon toasted bread cubes, turkey bites, apple sauce, cream of chicken soup, shrimp cocktail, beef stew, and chicken and rice!

Today space food is used by nations as a way to share (and show off) their cultural identity. Sunita Williams is known for celebrating her cultural heritage by taking samosas and Slovenian sausages to the cosmos (she has a Slovene-American mother). While variety is welcome, the non-negotiables of space food have remain unchanged over the years.