Astrobromatology (SPACE FOOD) with Maggie Coblentz

Dehydrated eggs. Airborne tortillas. Pouches of chicken. Tang. Work up an appetite for space food with artist, designer and Astrobromatologist, Maggie Coblentz. She shares how the intersection of design and science led her skyward, doing experiments on zero G flights, and shipping miso into space. We also talk Martian gardening, stinky roommates, booze bans, contraband corned beef, velcro fatigue, the ethics of space tourism, how to make barbecued wings in orbit, and addressing the conspiracy of astronaut ice cream.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Alie Ward?

  Oh, hey, it's the lady with her overcoat sticking out of the car door, Ally Ward. This is Ologies. I hope you have an appetite for airplane food like no other. Astrobermatology, and it's delicious. Is it? Let's talk. But first, thank you to all the patrons who were hungry for information about this Ology. You send in your questions ahead of time. You too can support Ologies and join Patreon.com/ologies for as little as a buck a month. Huge shout out to patron Jillian Dugan, who this week got an Ologies tattoo. Jillian, it is wonderful to spend life with you. I could not be more honored. Also, thank you to folks out there in lower commitment Ologies merch from OlogiesMerch.com, including shirts and hats and totes. Smallologies is our spinoff show of shorter, kid-friendly, and classroom-safe episodes.

• 0:45Alie Ward?

  You can find wherever you get podcasts. Also, thank you to everyone who reviews the show. I read them all, and they help so much to remind me I'm not recording in a dark room just for myself. Like this week's from nature lover Katie2Shoes, who wrote, "Thank you. I am richer for your work." And Mushroom Screams, "I appreciate you taking Ologies along on your owl banding trip." Also, thank you to the sponsors of the show who make it possible for us to donate to a charity of the Ologists choosing each week.

• 1:14Alie Ward?

  How's your ponytail looking? Maybe like a little thinner than it used to? We've talked about this in our menopause episode. At some point, it's bound to happen to all of us. So if you're ready for thicker, fuller hair, start your free online visit today at forhers.com/ologies for personalized care. So that's F-O-R-H-E-R-S.com/ologies. Individual results may vary. Featured products include compounded drug products, which the FDA does not approve or verify for safety, effectiveness, or quality. Prescription required. Price varies based on product and subscription plan. See website for full details, restrictions, and important safety information. Peppa Pig is your preschooler's best friend. Give the gift of bike riding confidence this year and help Peppa learn to ride her bike.

• 1:58Alie Ward?

  Kids can imagine learning to ride a bike with the Ready Pedal Go Peppa Bicycle Playset. Put Peppa's helmet on, attach the push stick to her bike, and push to make her pedal. Ready Pedal Go Peppa and more from Peppa Pig are now available at all major retailers this holiday season.

• 2:19Alie Ward?

  Ugh, trips are full of unexpected discoveries. Maybe you see a sea slug, or you find out that your friend still sleeps with a stuffed animal. But when it comes to your vacation rental, there should not be any surprises. When you book a Verbo vacation rental, if what you expect isn't what you get, Verbo Care has you covered. If something's broken or just not right, Verbo will work to make it right. Plus, you get 24/7 live human support with every booking. Grab your stuffy, we're going on vacay. So book today on the Verbo app. If you know you Verbo. Terms apply. See verbo.com/trust for details.

• 2:55Alie Ward?

  As long as I've got you in the giving mindset, I wanted to fill you in that from our Trolleyology episode in late August, the wonderful site Giving Multiplier set up a custom Ologies URL to donate to your favorite charity and then split the donation with highly effective global charities. In those few months, Ologites have raised over $690,000 via givedirectly.org/ologies. We will link it in the show notes. You have helped lift 25 households out of extreme poverty, provided 1,500 children's seasonal malaria prevention, given over 120,000 kids vital vitamin supplements that have saved 70 kids' lives, plus so much more good, I would need a whole hour at least to list

• 3:40Alie Ward?

  it off. And through December, we're in a competition with 23 other podcasters, including Yale professor Dr. Laurie Santos of the Happiness Lab podcast, who was in our Utemology episode. So if you're looking to donate to both your favorite charity and highly effective ones, the site givedirectly.org/ologies is amazing. We get nothing and we win nothing. This is just a friendly competition to raise some money. We will link givedirectly.org/ologies in the show notes. If you're looking for a less consumery holiday season, requesting a donation to your favorite charity can be a really great gift instead of... Another pair of slippers. So that's give directly.org slash ologies. Okay, on to astro-bromatology.

• 4:24Alie Ward?

  Astro means celestial body or star in ancient Greek. And bromo in Greek means food. So of course, space food. This ologist is an artist and designer turned scientist who got their masters in industrial design from RISD. They have researched space food at MIT. They worked in the science division at the Nat Geo Society. They've sent miso to ferment on the International Space Station. They've studied solar ovens in Norway, looked at bread making in space and attended the UN's meeting of the Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space. They also founded an initiative called Fieldscape that connects artists and scientists to work creatively and collaboratively, which is great.

• 5:06Alie Ward?

  We'll talk about that intersection as well as powdered meats, orange breakfast beverages, Martian gardening, espresso in zero G, how eating without gravity is like having COVID, canned stews, stinky roommates, contraband, corned beef, Velcro fatigue, wearing a space helmet on the roller coaster of a parabolic flight, and the future of food with artist, researcher, space food expert, and thus astro-bromatologist Maggie Coblentz.

• 5:53Alie Ward?

  Maggie Coblentz, she/her. I talk to so many people, Maggie. I ask them about their jobs. And you have one of the weirdest. It's so cool. It's so like, space food? Like, who does that? And the answer is Maggie. That's nuts. Does it come up at dinner parties? Does it come up at like, let me introduce you to Maggie. She wears a helmet on a vomit comet to smell sizzling miraposa. Does that come up? It does. I have a lot of names from friends. Space Maggie. I have a friend who calls me Astro Gastronomer, Space Witch.

• 6:35Alie Ward?

  We have a friend who works at NASA who works in spectroscopy. We call her the mistress of space rainbows.

• 6:41Speaker 01

  Oh, I love that.

• 6:42Alie Ward?

  And I think that just means you're very well loved. I feel like the question you must get the most is like, how can I do this? Does that come up a lot?

• 6:51Speaker 01

  Yeah, or I think it's more just this maybe bewilderment. How did you come to do what you do? Or, yeah, why do you do what you do? I'm not sure how many people are aspiring space food experts, but there's always a lot of questions.

• 7:07Alie Ward?

  When The Martian came out, did you feel like, that's it? I'm going to talk about potatoes to acquaintances for the rest of my life?

• 7:14Speaker 02

  It's been 48 souls since I planted the potatoes. So now it's time to reap and resew. They grew even better than I expected. I now have 400 healthy potato plants.

• 7:25Speaker 01

  I thought that was so cool. I was just so excited that The Martian was actually interviewing space food experts and bringing research into their process. So it felt like, okay, this is, there's a lot of directions. One could take this.

• 7:38Alie Ward?

  Okay, quick aside. Andy Weir's 2011 book, The Martian, was made into a movie in 2015. And in it, Matt Damon tried to grow potatoes on Mars. Afterward, NASA consulted with the International Potato Center to see if this could be done because it would be helpful to have potatoes on Mars. So they tried with this Mars-esque soil from Peru. But Mars dirt is toxic to human and plant life. So five years later, in 2021, this astrophysics professor figured out that certain bacteria might gobble up the toxic compounds in Mars soil. And as of a 2024 article titled, Detoxifying Mars:

• 8:20Alie Ward?

  The Biocatalytic Elimination of Omnipresent Perchlorates, NASA announced that it'll try this method for cleaning the soil and the mostly subterranean ice on Mars. So perhaps space taters might one day be on the menu when we bail on this planet. So, science, it imitates art.

• 8:41Speaker 01

  Now, you also, you have a background in art and design, too. How did this all kind of come about? It's a really wide, general question, and I'm sorry, but I literally don't know even where to begin. Because it's so cool. Sometimes I also don't know where to begin. But it's true. For me, it fits, but it also feels like a little bit of a jump. I think space is changing so much, the field of space. So it's not just scientists, engineers, technologists, but there's a lot of different disciplines who are contributing. My goal in starting this research endeavor was not actually to get a job, although that's where I landed with space food.

• 9:19Speaker 01

  I was approaching it very much with the designers or industrial designers' lens and looking at how do people live in space? I thought that was such a weird question and really stretched my imagination. So investigating the design of the International Space Station and how it's built, what's inside? What kind of furniture do they have? What are the space suits like? What is the food like? How does this inform the way that they can conduct their work? How they bring culture up there? The systems in place, who's allowed to go, who's not allowed to go because of these different designed objects in zero gravity? And how everything flips on its head once you get to space? So as a designer and artist, someone who loves to make things, this entire process changes in zero G.

• 10:03Speaker 01

  So with food, it's fluid dynamics. Do you need to be strapped to the wall while you eat or while you conduct your work? This was my entry point as a designer.

• 10:11Alie Ward?

  Do they have models on the ground of the space station for you to kind of conceptualize? Or do you have to go based on renderings and CAD and photos?

• 10:22Speaker 01

  For me, I was going off of photos when I started this investigation. So I was looking at things online and interviewing people and a lot of anecdotal insights from astronauts just to describe in their own words what this space looked like. And then testing came later when I joined a new research lab and started to have access to things like zero G flights.

• 10:43Alie Ward?

  There must be so much Velcro, right?

• 10:46Speaker 01

  There is a lot of Velcro. Everything's strapped down. But one of my favorite stories about the ISS, it actually didn't even include a dining table at first. So it was just thought that these- Humans almost treated like robots. We're just going to go up there, float around, Velcro their food to the walls, strap themselves to the walls while they ate. And of course, naturally, human beings want to gather. They want to have a place to come together and enjoy this, you know, very limited break in their day. And so one day, an astronaut just found some scrap piece of material and strapped it to the wall to make a table, which really has no practical use in space. As you say, like you need Velcro. You can't just have something sitting on a table.

• 11:28Speaker 01

  But still, it was this human nature to have some kind of design, intervention for a meal and for socializing with their fellow crewmates.

• 11:38Speaker 03

  As you can see, this is an open concept.

• 11:41Alie Ward?

  I imagine that your work has to encompass anthropology, technology, physiology, gastroenterology, proctology. Like, it must involve so many different disciplines. Coming from an artistic background, is that part of what is exciting about it? Is that kind of learning and tinkering?

• 12:02Speaker 01

  Yeah, indeed. I borrow pieces from all of these different fields or ologies to create something new.

• 12:09Alie Ward?

  What are they eating up there in general? I always feel like if you grew up, you know, pre 2000, like you might have heard of astronauts drinking a lot of Tang.

• 12:19Speaker 04

  Astronauts do some things you do. In space, they drank Tang. They mixed it like this in a zero G pouch, because with no gravity, it would fly all over. You don't have that problem.

• 12:30Alie Ward?

  So Tang was born in 1957. It was created by food daddy William Mitchell, who also made such Frankenfoods as Cool Whip, Quick Set Jell-O, and the eternally baffling Pop Rocks. Now, the parent company, General Foods, had military contracts, no surprise. And in tests, shelf-stable Tang with its sugar, maltodextrin, and vitamin C helped mask the taste of the space capsule water supply. So in the early 1960s, Tang was sent into space, and John Glenn thus became an astro-influencer, and Tang took off like a rocket. Now, in 2013, NASA's Apollo 11 Buzz Aldrin astronaut publicly stated during an awards show.

• 13:15Speaker 01

  Tang sucks.

• 13:16Alie Ward?

  When you sort of started this and you started logging, okay, like, how are they eating? What are they eating now? What was the baseline? What were they eating?

• 13:24Speaker 01

  The history of space food is so fascinating that the different space agencies have their own dining modules or their own cooking equipment. So NASA and the European Space Agency seem to share different systems for preparing food on the ground to go up to space. And then how do you actually prepare the food in space? So originally, it was canned, which is extremely heavy and not the most practical, although it is a mode of preserving food. But this is heavy and costly to actually get to space. So at some point, we're creating freeze dried foods. So this is just a dried food like Tang, but it's not always powdered form. It usually looks more like a sponge. I actually have some sitting in front of me right now.

• 14:07Speaker 01

  So it's a burger patty that's been snapped in half and packed into this plastic wrap with all of the liquid removed from it. So it weighs practically nothing. A tiny circle of Velcro on the side so an astronaut could attach it to a wall. And there's a barcode on it because astronauts are, everything that they eat is monitored from the ground. So they would scan in what they eat so that their nutritionist could supervise this for them. And it tells you how much water to add. So there's a little spout on the top of the package and they would attach it to something called the rehydration station, which is on the International Space Station. It's something almost like 90 or 99% of the water that's used is recycled from human

• 14:51Speaker 01

  urine, human perspiration. And then that gets processed and you put that back into your food as a warm or hot water and then let it sit and cut the package open with scissors and eat it directly from the bag. So a lot of these foods are modeled after MREs, which are military rations.

• 15:10Alie Ward?

  So quick background, given the

• 15:13Alie Ward?

  Astronomical shipping costs to destination orbit. The price to ship water up there is roughly $83,000 per gallon. So you gotta recycle, folks. The International Space Station's WPA, or Water Processor Assembly, involves harvesting water vapor. And then that's in conjunction with a UPA, which is short for Urine Processor Assembly. Don't you dare retch. Don't do it. I hate to break it to you. Where do you think your water comes from? A huge Sparklet's barrel in heaven? No, dude. Your Nalgene is filled with liquid that used to be frog snot and cruise ship toilets and elephant tears.

• 15:57Alie Ward?

  So according also to a 2023 space.com article titled, "NASA Just Recycled 98% of All Astronaut Pee and Sweat on the ISS, and Engineers Are Thrilled." The end result of this water reclamation is far superior to what municipal water systems produce on the ground. So yeah, if you drink a glass of earthling tap water with your MRE, or meal, ready to eat, it is technically grosser than what they eat miles above the planet. They're like, it's war chow. Exactly. Get used to it, right? Shut up and chow down. Exactly.

• 16:37Speaker 01

  But today it's different. There's, I think La Vazza sent up an espresso machine because the coffee is, again, just powdered, like an instant coffee. You add water. Another company called Zero T Kitchen sent up an oven so they could bake the first cookie in space. There's lots of people who are trying to help these poor astronauts with food.

• 16:56Alie Ward?

  When we're talking like first space flights, I imagine this wasn't even a concern for decades because they were up and back pretty quickly, right?

• 17:05Speaker 01

  Right.

• 17:05Alie Ward?

  When did they even start worrying about like, you're gonna need a snack?

• 17:09Speaker 01

  Yeah, I guess it would be. Around the Apollo era, when astronauts started going to space for longer term, and they would actually need to bring days of food supply and keep it in their capsule with them. And then now the food plans are changing even more, where the current food system is supposed to last five years, and they have the Deep Space Food Program at NASA, at least, to start to think about what is food for Mars? And what are the challenges associated with preparing those foods? How will different space environment conditions impact the food? Will it degrade? Will the color, texture, nutrition value change for these trips where the return date is not even known?

• 17:46Alie Ward?

  So the Deep Space Food Challenge concluded in 2024, and the three winners were a professor and student team from UC Riverside, who invented NOLUX, which means "without light," to grow plants and fungi in a dark little chamber using acetate to stimulate growth instead of light. And another winner of this challenge was this nifty contraption called SATED, which stands for Safe Appliance, Tidy, Efficient, and Delicious. Okay. And it uses centrifugal force to press food against a heated cylinder, thus enabling

• 18:26Alie Ward?

  the layering of foods, such as the coveted slice of za in space. But the grand prize of the Deep Space Food Challenge went to this Florida team who created something called NUCLEUS. Again, they love an acronym. It stands for Nutritional Closed Loop Eco-Unit System. And that helps farm greens and vegetables and edible bugs with minimal effort from the crew. It's kind of a set-it-and-forget-it Ron Popeil situation. At that point, are they trying to terraform and grow, you know, Matt Damon potatoes in a bubble?

• 19:02Speaker 01

  Sometimes I'm sitting in a room and I don't know if I'm on a set of a science fiction film or if I'm actually in a real science meeting because you think, is this really what's what's happening right now? There's, you know, the Veggie Project on the ISS that's growing fresh ingredients in space, but these are really just herbs and little pieces of lettuce that are more for emotional wellbeing to add a sprig to your food. It's unrealistic that an astronaut could truly sustain themselves off of what's possible to grow in space, at least with what technology we have now.

• 19:34Alie Ward?

  And this suitcase-sized ISS garden, launched in 2014, and it's grown Mizuna mustard, red Russian kale, some edible zinnia flowers and some Chinese cabbage. So it's just nice to have a sprig here and there, but it is no hometown buffet salad bar because you are very far from a hometown and NASA does not have the budget for all you can eat. Also, hometown buffet doesn't even exist anymore. Since the start of COVID, people were not down with just a Plexiglas sneeze guard. So America's favorite unlimited cafeteria experience went belly up.

• 20:12Speaker 01

  Do you have to look through a lot of research on what do the astronauts say? Were they like, this is dog shit? Like, I couldn't even eat it. So for me, it was more interviews, anecdotal reports from astronauts, mostly ESA and NASA astronauts. And oftentimes when interviewing them, they sort of start off by saying, you know, food doesn't matter. This was my life dream to go to space. I was perhaps trained in the military and it's no concern for me because I'm just in space.

• 20:39Speaker 05

  I'm just happy to be here.

• 20:41Speaker 01

  But then you get a little bit deeper into the conversation and then the complaining starts and it's horrible. And they don't have anywhere to put their food waste, so they get this tremendous food fatigue because they have to eat their food out of this plastic and they can't just throw it out because it could rot or even, you know, combust. So they actually have to lick all of the packages clean after every single meal. There's no fridge to store their leftovers. One Italian astronaut, Paolo Nespoli, told me the chocolate's horrible. So he's complaining about the chocolate and the truth comes out eventually.

• 21:15Alie Ward?

  If you're thirsty for more tea made from used water, let's peer into the September 2025 article from Frontiers in Psychology titled,

• 21:23Alie Ward?

  Food acceptability and selection by astronauts on International Space Station mission informs strategies and risks for deep space exploration, which surveyed 15 astronauts on the International Space Station. What are some takeaways? The breakfast foods and the lack of vegetables sucked the most, and quote, astronauts limited their menu selections to personal favorites early in the mission and did not consume foods they did not like, a habit that could compromise nutritional intake. And this is nothing new. As far back as the 1963 Mercury Flight, astronaut L. Gordon Cooper was served the first freeze dried meals, and through his 34 hour mission,

• 22:07Alie Ward?

  he ate only 700 of the 2,400 calories available to him. So, space food, is it the ultimate appetite suppressant? Unfortunately, sometimes yes. So, the 2017 study, Initial Assessment of the Nutritional Quality of the Space Food System Over Three Years of Ambient Storage, in the journal Microgravity, indicated that potassium, calcium, vitamin D, and vitamin K concentrations in space food may not be adequate even before storage. And then during storage, they observed the degradation of it, so decreases in certain vitamins just from sitting around. And there was a 2025 article in Nature titled, Feeding the Cosmos: Tackling Personalized Space Nutrition and the Leaky Gut Challenge.

• 22:52Alie Ward?

  I was like, what? And that found evidence that suggested increased intestinal permeability, referred to as leaky gut syndrome, which further disrupts nutrient absorption and immune regulation. How does one fix that? The authors proposed bioengineering some really nutrient dense crops, adding antioxidants to the meals, and tailoring foods to specific astronauts' genomes. Now, if there were a Yelp for NASA, what would the review say? We're lucky, because in that food acceptability study I mentioned before, astronauts, who were identified anonymously, I guess so was not to hurt anyone's feelings, dished up their real thoughts.

• 23:37Alie Ward?

  And one remarked, "There are not enough vegetables and fruit, and these go fast. Too much nuts and too much soup, so we are always down to just soup and nuts." Ha ha, they said, "Because vegetables and fruit get eaten more quickly." Astronaut B said, I have noticed that items are becoming a bit dull. Variety and new foods at this point in the mission is a most welcome addition. Jay begged for sauces, saying almost everything could benefit from condiments. Astronaut B, again, submitted some remarks. Mmm, it read like the confessional booth on a reality show. I'm living for them, bitching that I have a crew member that is eating a specific diet.

• 24:20Alie Ward?

  Because of their food choices, we burn through many of the foods I like very quickly. The perceived variety is reduced and the repetition of food selections is increased. This specific diet by one crew member, they said, has an adverse effect on the rest of the crew. So imagine someone stealing your quiche from the employee fridge at work, but you are 250 miles above your home planet. You share a cubicle that smells like gym shorts and you have to drink each other's pee. I would have gone on an untethered spacewalk by like day three. I'm out. Did you have to eat any of it?

• 24:59Speaker 01

  I have eaten some of it. I have a personal collection of space food with me at all times. I have, actually, I have some, I have a few really special ones. I'm waiting for the day. I don't know. This one I'm holding right now is from March 2016. It's steak.

• 25:12Alie Ward?

  Wow.

• 25:13Speaker 01

  It's actually not freeze dried. It kind of feels like a piece of rubber. So I'm waiting for a special day to open that. And it may or may not be eaten if I'm next to a hospital.

• 25:24Alie Ward?

  Ooh, um, okay. The ice cream sandwiches that we used to get at like Discovery Zone centers and things like that. Do they like them up there? Can they eat the whole thing? Do they eat them up there?

• 25:35Speaker 01

  So that is not really space food, which is probably, I know, it's very disappointing news. I actually did a school presentation on space ice cream, I think in grade two, which life is full circle. But that is a demonstration of the freeze drying technology. But at least it would not be eaten in that form because it has to be rehydrated. Otherwise, these little crumb flyaways, if you've ever actually had a chance to eat these ice cream bars or freeze dried ice cream, it crumbles almost as soon as you take a bite into it. So those little flyaways in the space station are highly problematic.

• 26:11Alie Ward?

  So, okay, let's say that you have a couple of bars in your pantry, which, to be honest, I do, because for some reason, I've always loved dehydrated ice cream bars. I don't know why, if there's just nostalgia, or if it's just like, when else can you eat chalk? But should I be rehydrating that in hot water and then eating it as a goopy mess to really get the astronaut experience? I will report back on this ice cream rehydration experiment later in the episode. It's soaking right now. But for now, expeditions to the International Space Station usually last about six months. And it's a joint operation between Europe, the United States, Russia, Canada, and Japan. Now, the craft itself, the ISS, is around the size of a football

• 26:52Alie Ward?

  field. Inside, though, the habitable area is 13,000 cubic feet, which is about 1,300 square feet, or the size of a small, one-story, three-bedroom house. Typically, there are seven crew members on the ISS at a time. But as they're swapping out, or if you get marooned up there, which happens, there might be more. The record is 13 at once. Thirteen people in a three-bedroom house, all breathing each other's air, vying for one fresh arugula leaf, drinking lukewarm instant coffee. So if you're out there, if you have two roommates

• 27:35Alie Ward?

  and you're eating a can of Progresso for dinner, you're living the high life. Oh, speaking of canned food, Maggie is giving me more of a show and tell here, which I would take any day over a taste and smell.

• 27:47Speaker 01

  You know, it's not the kind of can you would feel comfortable actually opening and eating.

• 27:50Alie Ward?

  Wow.

• 27:50Speaker 01

  It's from the European Space Agency, Braised Calf Cheeks with Vegetables in Balsamic Vinegar Sauce. So I think the European Space Agency maybe has a different take on the menu than NASA. But NASA, they do have scrambled eggs. It looks like your dish sponge. So it's a cube of yellow that you add water and eat. They have teriyaki chicken. I think that's super popular. Apparently, the fish is not a fan favorite because your crewmates don't enjoy the smell. It's a tiny capsule, so. You can imagine that anything you eat or heat up and open is going to, you know, add its own special aromas into this shared space. I recently encountered JAX's menus, that's the Japanese space agency.

• 28:32Speaker 01

  And I decided if I'm going to space, I'm signing up for their menu. All of the foods are made from different research institutes and universities. So I think already that's just adding a lot of flavor and excitement. And they have soy glazed eel and fried chicken and all sorts of different mochi desserts.

• 28:52Alie Ward?

  I'm on board. But to file under the only thing in the world improving in 2025 is European Space Agency astronaut Sophie Adanos' personal space selections. So she tapped the world's most Michelin starred and internationally lauded female chef, Anne Sophie Peak, to craft the bonus food items she'll get up there. And they include foie gras cream on toasted brioche with candied lemon, lobster bisque with crab and caraway, parsnip velouté with curry and smoked haddock. So to the long list of spacecraft words that I don't know, add velouté. Actually, take that back because I looked it up and it's a buttery savory gravy

• 29:36Alie Ward?

  that means mother sauce, which probably sounds much more elegant in French. Now, other international bonus items have included maple cookies for a Canadian, rice with beef flavored stew and mackerel with teriyaki sauce for Japanese crew members, and beef ravioli and beef stroganoff with noodles for the US team. I'm surprised that there's so much beef. Did that surprise you at all, like what sources of food were selected?

• 30:05Speaker 01

  It wouldn't be my take, but I think it actually didn't surprise me. It felt like, okay, this is again, sort of telling of how at least the current NASA menu is being designed and for who. Protein is probably important in space, not that you can't get that from vegetarian food or other options, but it did seem quite, yeah, meat heavy, chicken, beef.

• 30:25Alie Ward?

  Yeah, like meat and potatoes.

• 30:27Speaker 01

  Like a kind of classic American menu. Yeah. And the most, you know, internationals, as I said, like teriyaki chicken, but it's still kind of an American. Take on that dish.

• 30:38Alie Ward?

  And you mentioned something about fish smells. And I know that your work deals with the aromas that we might be missing on earth and the sounds of cooking. Do the senses work similarly? Or is there anything that's blunted?

• 30:52Speaker 01

  It's very different, at least from what astronauts report. You know, if you're having lunch at the office versus your home versus a beautiful beach backdrop, your experience of eating is going to change. It might not be something that we think about. So eating food in this tiny capsule that's louder and smaller than an airplane is already not the best place to start. There's physiological changes in the body happening to astronauts. So it's something they call space face. So they almost look like, not quite like a chipmunk, but their cheeks puff up. So they have fluids arising in the body in zero G. So they have a bit of congestion in their face, which affects how they can smell and how they can taste. Some astronauts reported that it was almost like if you have a cold and you can't really

• 31:36Speaker 01

  taste your food or things just taste a little bit off. And then the second thing is just the environment of space. So well, first you're eating something out of a plastic bag, including your coffee, drinking from a straw. So you're not having this experience of sipping your coffee, feeling the warmth on your face. The aromas are rising, all of these different things. Astronauts tell us that this space station smells like a gym locker because it's this tiny space. I mean, I already described how their water is made from urine and perspiration when they have to work out for hours of the day. What do you do with your sweaty shirt? You can't just dry it or wring it out. So they'll often hang them in front of the ventilation systems.

• 32:14Alie Ward?

  Oh, dear.

• 32:15Speaker 01

  There's lots going on.

• 32:17Alie Ward?

  So a recent article titled, What Does the International Space Station Smell Like? Published by The Hill, divulged that former NASA astronaut Scott Kelly likened the odor to a jail he once visited, describing it as a combination of antiseptic, garbage and body odor. He said, "We use deodorant, we wipe, rinse off, shower, but there's a little body odor going on for sure." He continued, "Mostly it's just exercise clothes people wear for a couple of weeks without washing." He also added, per the article, "That in zero G bodily smells, such as farts, tend to linger." I should note that on all of the menus that I looked at, I only saw beans once.

• 33:00Speaker 01

  Ooh, I can absolutely feel.

• 33:05Alie Ward?

  And smell that and almost taste it, which is so,

• 33:11Alie Ward?

  it's so challenging, but it's a dream. So I totally get that. But at the same time, you, you really have to make sure that morale is up in order to perform well, right?

• 33:23Speaker 01

  Mm hmm. So there's this stereotype that seems to be true, that astronauts love hot sauce. And I think that's, that's one of the reasons, just to try to, you know, add salt, add hot sauce to boost, boost that flavor.

• 33:36Alie Ward?

  When it comes to those smells and the sounds too, I think one thing that's really interesting about your work is, you know, you've been on these flights to test out cooking. And I'm like, oh, is there cooking in space? I always figured that they were just like eating like granola bar or which are too crummy, but I didn't even think about the preparation. Like, where does the preparation come into it?

• 33:58Speaker 01

  The preparation at present is mostly on the ground. So yeah, all this food is prepared in different lab contexts and packaged and probably put into some kind of quarantine, tested and then goes to space. Even the, the vegetable project I referenced earlier where they're growing herbs and different things in space to see how it works. The astronauts usually aren't allowed to eat them. And even like touching them or interacting with them is extremely restricted. I mean, I won't get into toileting on this conversation, but you can imagine there's a whole long list of challenges to do with that in zero gravity. So they're very concerned with astronauts getting sick, getting food poisoning in space, because what would you do? So for that reason, most food is not actually prepared in space.

• 34:42Alie Ward?

  Join me, if you will, in reading the 2013 NBC News article, Vomit in Space? Astronaut Tells Why It's Not So Easy, which number one wrongly assumes that I thought it'd be easy, but it continues that TLDR. They have really good double sealed barf bags. And a 2022 PopSci article took a downtown with the piece, What Happens If You Get Diarrhea in Space? The thesis is the vacuum toilet, per usual, plus Imodium. Or the more wearable solution, a space diaper. And you've created something that's like a helmet where you can actually smell and feel your food more, right? Like, how did that design come about?

• 35:23Speaker 01

  My space food helmet came about because I was going to go on this zero-gravity flight. And because I was working with food and liquids and small edible things, they were concerned that, you know, this could get in the way of other people's experiments, because this was a research flight. So we had, I think, around 20 different engineers and scientists on this flight, all conducting quite serious science experiments. And they wanted me to have a glove box, which is commonly used in science. So it is basically what it sounds like. It's a box, a clear box, with gloves where you can insert your hands, and then you don't actually put your hands inside the box, because you're really putting your hands inside the gloves, inside the box, if that makes sense.

• 36:06Alie Ward?

  Yeah.

• 36:06Speaker 01

  And then you can see yourself conducting the experiment. Everything is very contained and sterile and scientific. I didn't want to use this, because it didn't really make sense for food. How could I eat? Because my face is over here, and my hands are over here. So then I decided I will just make a glove box around my face. And this became the space food helmet where I had. And I also just had this vision of myself, almost like a goldfish, like, you know, trying to catch my food with my mouth. So I had this giant aquarium. I actually found this aquarium supplier, manufacturer, who produced these different sizes of clear domes and spheres. And so I ordered one for my face, and then 3D-printed this harness, so I could, yeah, put my hands inside. And they couldn't say no to me, because I followed all the rules.

• 36:49Speaker 01

  It just was a slightly different format. They just wanted to make sure that I had to practice my helmet-removal strategy. So if I started choking in zero G, I could have this quick release, or, you know, if I threw up, which isn't common on the vomit comet.

• 37:05Alie Ward?

  How was the vomit comet?

• 37:08Speaker 01

  I had an amazing time. I think everybody on that flight was my mouth. I've never smiled so big in my life. I was smiling ear to ear. It was such a blast. I mean, there's 20 parabolas, so the plane is, you know, going in this parabolic maneuver, pitching down at 45 degrees, and then up at 45 degrees, and then you experience zero G and hyper G at the base. Of those parabolas and hyper G is also wild experience. I think that's around 1.8 Gs. So you feel like you're at the bottom of the ocean floor. You have to quickly get to the bottom of the plane, lie yourself down. You can barely move your head. You feel like you have the weight of the world on you.

• 37:48Speaker 01

  A friend described it to me like if you ever had one of those dreams where you feel like someone's pinning you down. It kind of feels a little bit like that. So you have that and then all of a sudden you start floating and then you have to take advantage of this 30 second moment in weightlessness to conduct different aspects of your experiment. So I designed mine around a tasting menu. So these small bites of things that I could smell something, hear something, taste something at these different moments of of weightlessness.

• 38:19Alie Ward?

  What did you gather from that research? Like what worked and what didn't?

• 38:22Speaker 01

  I think what I gathered was what you can do in 30 seconds of weightlessness is unsurprisingly very limited. So that was a huge challenge. I also gathered that being in weightlessness is a lot of fun and it's so fascinating. But just having to relearn how you use your body for the most basic of tasks, including eating, including switching a knob, turning on your camera, how you position your elbows. And it's just a really surreal experience, almost like being a baby and trying to learn how to walk. Your legs are not needed, which is also really interesting to think about accessibility in space and things that are useful here on Earth are not necessary in a zero G environment.

• 39:07Speaker 01

  So you get to think through all of these ways of existing differently. So that's like the holistic experience that I took from it. And then just the pure joy and playfulness that at least through this experiment, we were able to bring to it, which I think when you look at an astronaut's schedule, their entire day is planned into these 15 minute increments of different tasks and operations. Their time is so valuable when they're up there in space. They barely have time to do anything. And so for our experiment, same thing, it had to be line by line, exactly what you're going to do. But can we intervene and? Leave room for mistakes and leave room for improvisation.

• 39:46Alie Ward?

  During one of Maggie's food tests on that zero G parabolic flight, horribly nicknamed the vomit comet, she wanted to see if eating rehydrated meals while listening to the sounds of crackling frying food improved the experience, or if smelling aromas of food enhanced the bland taste.

• 40:06Speaker 01

  And then with astronauts, I conducted some on Earth taste tests and interviews with virtual reality to customize these different experiences. For one astronaut who grew up near an apple orchard, they wanted to have this experience of eating outside. So could they eat something freeze dried while using this virtual reality to have this nostalgic feeling of being back on Earth? And at least in this context of this experiment, it was highly effective and at least evoked these stories and helped draw out what the importance of culture and ritual and food was for them in an environment where that's not always part of the discussion.

• 40:45Alie Ward?

  Do they eat less up there or more up there? Because they're going through so many calories, like exercising to keep their muscle mass and bone density. Like, do they need to eat more? Like, is it important for them to keep their appetite?

• 40:59Speaker 01

  I think they're eating less up there because they're reporting to experience this food fatigue for all the reasons that we, you know, generally unpleasant. There's another story I love of these twin astronauts, Scott and Mark Kelly. One went to space. One was an astronaut, did not go to space. And they wanted to conduct this really interesting genetic study on these individuals because they were identical twins. So really understanding what happens to the body in space compared to the second version of yourself on Earth. And they wanted the twin who did not get to go to space to eat the identical menu to his brother. And he said, absolutely not. There is no way. If I'm not going to space, there is no way you're forcing me to eat that food.

• 41:43Speaker 01

  So there were some gaps in the being able to understand like what really happens to the body with this diet. But I think that they're heavily monitored and encouraged to eat specific things. And each meal lists the calories that I'm sure is customized for the astronaut and their body type. And they would do lots of different testing on Earth before they went to space to understand their metabolism and working with nutritionists. Different consultants, which I think can be quite frustrating.

• 42:09Alie Ward?

  Oh, I'm sure. I think that putting that kind of restriction on yourself when there's not necessarily like a primal need to is really difficult.

• 42:19Speaker 01

  Food is so personal.

• 42:20Alie Ward?

  Right.

• 42:21Speaker 01

  How do we give autonomy to human beings in space? How do we let people make decisions around their own health and wellbeing in an environment that's incredibly controlled? Because you have to jump through all of these hoops, so much bureaucracy, so many safety protocols, which I sometimes call these excuses. And how can we like find ways around that that include a bit more personality or something different?

• 42:47Alie Ward?

  Yeah.

• 42:48Speaker 01

  And that's incredibly exciting.

• 42:50Alie Ward?

  What are some of those restrictions? Like, what are some of those excuses that you came up against?

• 42:55Speaker 01

  I just think the level, and this isn't necessarily an excuse. I think a lot of this very much is legitimate and necessary. Designing the experiments, I had to log every detail to the type of ink that was in my pen that I was using to label.

• 43:08Alie Ward?

  Oh, wow.

• 43:09Speaker 01

  The glue, that precise tape that I was using. Of course, like the materials, if I was 3D printing something, because they want to understand, you know, how these materials might interact with something else. Is it flammable? Is it toxic? Could it produce an aroma? So in the case of the experiment I sent to the space station, at the very last minute, somebody, when it was just about to be loaded into the SpaceX rocket, it was like, it's producing some smell and we're very concerned. And then I had to remind them, like, this is a food product. So it does smell a little bit, but it's not just concerning, this is fermentation.

• 43:45Alie Ward?

  It is food.

• 43:48Speaker 01

  It is food.

• 43:49Alie Ward?

  Like, we worked hard on that smell.

• 43:53Alie Ward?

  Can I ask some questions from listeners? Because they had some really good ones. Okay. But before we hear your questions, let's donate to a cause. Theologist's Choosing this week, Maggie chose astroaccess.org, which is a project dedicated to promoting disability inclusion in human space exploration. And since its founding in 2021, Astro Access has conducted five microgravity missions in which Astro Access Ambassadors, disabled scientists, veterans, students, athletes and artists, perform demonstrations onboard parabolic flights with the Zero Gravity Corporation. And Astro Access says, if we can make space accessible, we can make any space accessible. So a donation will go to astroaccess.org. Thanks to Maggie and to sponsors of the show.

• 44:38Alie Ward?

  How's your ponytail looking? Maybe like a little thinner than it used to? We've talked about this in our menopause episode at some point. It's bound to happen to all of us. So if you're ready for thicker, fuller hair, start your free online visit today at forhers.com/ologies for personalized care. So that's F-O-R-H-E-R-S dot com slash ologies. Individual results may vary. Featured products include compounded drug products, which the FDA does not approve or verify for safety, effectiveness, or quality. Prescription required. Price varies based on product and subscription plan. See website for full details, restrictions, and important safety information. This podcast is brought to you by Squarespace. If you haven't heard me gushing about Squarespace for years, it's an all-in-one website platform. Whether you're trying to grow a business you have

• 45:23Alie Ward?

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• 46:06Alie Ward?

  And when you're ready to launch, use offer code OLOGIES to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. You can do it.

• 46:16Alie Ward?

  Listen, sometimes you get out of your routine. That happened to me recently when I went out of town and I realized I forgot my Ritual Essential for Women 18+. It's a multi that I've been taking for years. And guess who landed in another country without them? Me. Didn't feel right. They contain nine key nutrients, two delayed-release capsules designed for optimal absorption. But Ritual, why do I love them so much? They have a team of scientists. They poured over thousands of studies to figure out what are common gaps that people need in their diet, but they don't actually consume. It's also designed to be gentle on the stomach. You can take it with or without food, which I love. Plus, I like that it looks like a tiny lava lamp. I tell you that every time, but it has these beads and oil, and it tastes like mint. Easy down the hatch. I usually take them in the morning.

• 47:00Alie Ward?

  And the reason why I've stuck with Ritual for so many years is because my schedule's all over the place. Sometimes I'm eating breakfast. Sometimes I'm running through an airport with one shoe. So instead of striving for perfect health, aim for supporting foundational health. Save 25% on your first month at ritual.com/ologies. That's ritual.com/ologies for 25% off your first month.

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• 47:53Alie Ward?

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• 48:17Alie Ward?

  Okay, let's float some Patreon questions to Maggie. MJ, first time question asker, Sleepy John, Candell, Olivia Ford, Sonia Bird, Curtis Dog, Anastasia Press, Cedar, Lauren Harder, Glitter Tornado, Ashley Buford, and HC wanted to know, HC asked, has there ever been a vegan person in space before? MJ was like, first time question asker, are astronauts, do they have anything specialized for food allergies or religious purposes? Wanted to know, is it just too bad, so sad for these guys? Sleepy John asked, how do they handle food allergies? How do they minimize things? Olivia asked, to avoid things that might cause dietary discomfort that can't be comfortable in space?

• 49:00Alie Ward?

  So yeah, do you have to take that into consideration? Or is it really like, yo, you want to be an astronaut, you better not be celiac?

• 49:09Speaker 01

  I don't think it's that strict. I think things have definitely improved. There are quite a few menu options. I mean, peanut butter is easy to avoid, but let's say it was something like soy or something else that could be integrated into other products. That would be probably pretty difficult. And I think this is where ethics really come into play is especially for, you know, thinking about deep space missions, whether that's Mars or even just return to the moon or long-term space missions of another nature. Can you select people based on their ability to tolerate certain foods and different conditions? And I'm not, I'm not sure what the resolution on that is, but I think it's super complex.

• 49:49Alie Ward?

  So, bad news, vegans, non-dairy folks, egg allergists. NASA is knocked down with your dietary restrictions. Kind of like an elderly aunt on Thanksgiving. They're like, it's too hard. I'd have to make too many dishes. Not everyone wants to eat. But people and space agencies can evolve. And in the 2030s, there is a planned Mars mission that will be all vegetarian. Why is this? Lockheed Martin senior research scientist Maya Cooper told NBC News that meat and dairy don't preserve long enough to take to Mars and that, quote, "bringing a cow on the mission is not an option." And in terms of something like severe celiac that could exacerbate medical conditions through

• 50:33Alie Ward?

  cross-contamination, you might literally be shit out of luck.

• 50:37Speaker 01

  Luckily, bread's not popular in space, so it's not so much of an issue.

• 50:40Alie Ward?

  Is it too many crumbs?

• 50:41Speaker 01

  Crumbs, too many crumbs. We don't like crumbs in space, apparently. So tortillas are a fan favorite, and I'm sure they have lots of gluten-free options for that because you just wrap it up, you can eat it floating.

• 50:53Alie Ward?

  You know, a few people asked about tortillas. Meg Chadsey says that they are good friends with someone who was a good friend with Xena Cardman, who's an astronaut, commander of the SpaceX Crew 11 mission that launched to the ISS this August. And they have it on good authority that tortillas are a hot commodity up there for their practicality, but they're not currently able to ask Xena if space has been giving her any weird cravings. So tortillas are indeed a popular item up there?

• 51:25Speaker 01

  They are, yeah, because you can, I mean, a tortilla is a wrap, it's a plate, it's a vessel. You can do anything with a tortilla.

• 51:34Alie Ward?

  That makes so much more sense than, instead of like a, yeah, like sourdough is not happening up there, right?

• 51:40Speaker 01

  Yeah, and they, I mean, tortillas last a long time, they pack flat.

• 51:43Alie Ward?

  Genius.

• 51:44Speaker 01

  Yeah, genius, tortillas solving space problems.

• 51:47Alie Ward?

  Do you ever find that people have cravings? Anastasia Press, Odysseus, Odysseus, Peter Scheiss, Hackwin, and Michael A. Terriermind wanted to know if there have been recorded instances of astronauts who have rogue cravings. Michael wanted to know.

• 52:06Speaker 01

  Rogue cravings, sounds very extreme. I mean, you definitely hear the classic craving for a cold beer. I think a lot of people could relate to that, but I think cold things in general are craved because this rehydration station, it's hot water, it's warm water, it's room temperature water, but there's not really access to a refrigerator. And I never thought about that until it was described to me, and, you know, cold food might not be for everyone, but a refreshing drink or just like something chilly and fresh things, of course. All fresh foods, lettuce, biting into something fresh, those are all extremely.

• 52:46Speaker 01

  Limited chocolate, ice cream, real ice cream, pizza. It's like, basic stuff.

• 52:51Alie Ward?

  The chocolate, yeah, the chocolate is interesting to me. I should get back to that, but Joshua Martin, first time question asker, asked, are you allowed to have a beer in space and you get hammered off of two sips? Do they even allow it up there? Are they like, do you know how expensive this machinery is? You are not being buzzed using it.

• 53:09Speaker 01

  There's gotta be some contraband things. I mean, people are people. No one's told me anything. NASA astronauts will not tell me anything, but I think they get asked all the time, is there booze? There has to be booze. And then, you know, do the cosmonauts bring up vodka? And everyone wants to know, but beer, I think, no. I think canned, you know, carbonated beverages are a little bit challenging in space. And alcohol, generally speaking, I don't think they like working and drinking up there.

• 53:36Alie Ward?

  Yeah.

• 53:37Speaker 01

  Maybe one day.

• 53:38Alie Ward?

  I'm sure cosmonauts, looks like water.

• 53:41Speaker 01

  Looks like water, yeah.

• 53:43Alie Ward?

  One European Space Agency astronaut actually complimented the chef saying during a feedback survey interview that we all agreed that we are enjoying this food, but we have no doubt that it would taste much better if we had some wine with it as well. But booze is verboten now, although in July of 1969 Buzz Aldrin took some communion wine with him aboard Apollo 11. But in terms of contraband, just a side note, it's not worth it. Just ask Gemini 3 astronaut John W. Young, who confessed that, quote, "I hid a sandwich in my space suit. It was corned beef, went to space, the crumbs went everywhere."

• 54:23Alie Ward?

  But back to booze, it's not just drunk piloting or regrettable social media content at stake here. The chemistry of alcohol could throw the whole water recovery system out of whack. So don't even think of smuggling a wine cooler or mouthwash or aftershave or perfume with you, no matter how much stink needs masking. But without red wine, how are you going to justify a treat for antioxidants? In 2023, there was a Danish astronaut who developed chocolate bars called spacecrafted. Alongside a food scientist and on the ingredient list were dark chocolate and nearly 70 other natural ingredients such as seaweed, kale, probiotics, magnesium.

• 55:06Alie Ward?

  He didn't just bring his own, though. He packed 75 to share with his crewmates, which is like a stellar way to win over office people that you'll be very close with for half a year. Oh, on that note, Meron Molly wanted to know, they said Danish astronaut Andreas Morgensen brought specialty chocolate bars to the ISS on his 2023 mission. I'm curious to know more about those and the ingredients. Apparently, he also made chocolate mousse for his crew during the mission. Do certain astronauts say like, I gotta have this particular chocolate? Like, is it tough to just bring up a Snickers or something?

• 55:43Speaker 01

  There's always like a technical term for things. I think they call them like crew select items.

• 55:48Alie Ward?

  Oh.

• 55:49Speaker 01

  So they get their choose from their menu, which it could be 100 or so items. And then they have a few items which they can, like grocery store items. They just have to pass certain tests that they can be repackaged appropriately or meet the safety standard needs.

• 56:05Alie Ward?

  Mm hmm.

• 56:05Speaker 01

  So they they get a little a little something, make them feel special.

• 56:09Alie Ward?

  Oh, they get a tiny treat.

• 56:11Speaker 01

  Yeah, tiny treat. It's like being a kid.

• 56:13Alie Ward?

  Right.

• 56:14Speaker 01

  Feel good in the car ride, you can have this later.

• 56:16Alie Ward?

  So Brian Schneidgens wanted to know, I realize this may be superficial and silly, but what about treats? Sometimes you just want a piece of cake. Gosh darn it. Would this be considered a luxury food and therefore not offered? Does it help morale?

• 56:29Speaker 01

  It definitely helps morale. I mean, I don't think sadly you can get that piece of cake whenever you want it. That's life up there right now, but maybe one day. I know they sent like um Haagen Dazs bars or Magnum bars. I don't know what kind they were, but these ice cream bars, they got sent up to space in a freezer because there was a freezer going up.

• 56:48Alie Ward?

  Oh.

• 56:48Speaker 01

  Maybe with some blood samples, like when a freezer is going up to the space station with something for science, because that's the priority. If there's space, they might just sneak something in there for the astronauts. But then when I was talking to one of the astronauts who was complaining about that again, because they apparently they gave them only the tiny versions, not the full size versions. They thought that was really cheap of them.

• 57:10Alie Ward?

  Oh.

• 57:12Speaker 01

  They're like, thanks for this.

• 57:14Alie Ward?

  Come on.

• 57:14Speaker 01

  Really?

• 57:16Speaker 03

  And here we go. I hope you're hungry for nothing.

• 57:19Alie Ward?

  Have you heard of The Expanse, The Expanse books?

• 57:23Speaker 01

  Yeah, and I've also, I actually have not read them and I have, it's a TV show also, as far as I know.

• 57:29Alie Ward?

  Oh, is it? Okay. That's lasagna. It's voila. Sit down. Let's see, Colby Evans says The Expanse books give a lot of page time to bulbs of coffee, and asked if that is already a thing. And Alison D said there are some fictional instances of space food. Are there any fictional instances of space food done right? For example, there is kibble as a presumably low-cost, shelf-stable option in The Expanse books. It's not described in much detail beyond color. There's a red and a white one. But yeah, Alison D is curious about your thoughts about space kibble.

• 58:04Speaker 01

  Space kibble. That's like dog food, isn't it? Kibble?

• 58:06Alie Ward?

  Yeah, like if, okay, so I have a dog on Earth, right? She could be eating different things every day, but we feed her, you know, frozen pucks, right? Thawed frozen pucks. And she's fine. The vet is like, this is great for her. Is there any reason why human beings couldn't just be like, here's your puck with sweet potato and chicken? Have a good life.

• 58:29Speaker 01

  I mean, I think that's kind of what they're doing right now, which is a bit sad.

• 58:33Alie Ward?

  Yeah, that makes sense.

• 58:34Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's like, kind of what it is. But I've never heard of these coffee bulbs. Sounds beautiful.

• 58:39Alie Ward?

  Yeah, right?

• 58:41Speaker 01

  I'll have that here.

• 58:42Alie Ward?

  Yeah, seriously, a coffee bulb does sound like just walking down the street with like a, it sounds like it would have a good hand feel.

• 58:48Speaker 01

  Yes, pluck it off a tree.

• 58:51Alie Ward?

  Right. What about different like cultural recipes or things that make them feel connected to their home or make them feel more like themselves? This was also on the minds of Rachel Behr, Aortega, Nick Reed, Storm, Fire Goddess, Gabia Shimatute, Aga Geman, Marin Malling, Charlotte Parkinson, picky eater, warlock full-time who subsists on various grills, Nick Reed and brain shenanigans. Oh, and Gabija Semitier wanted to know about cultural considerations and personal preferences, and if food choices change based on the crew. Is there any? Anything about that, you know, let's say that you really miss your mom's curry, you know?

• 59:31Speaker 01

  Yeah, I think there's been a few stories that resonated with me. There was Kim Chi has been to space. I know that there was with the first Korean astronaut, Kim Chi was specially prepared and freeze dried. So it wasn't a living fermented food, but it was, you know, understood that this is something of extreme cultural significance and should figure out a way for it to go to space. In another instance, with JAXA, the Japanese space agency, an astronaut wanted to bring Sakura flour, not as food, but as Sakura flour to space to remind them of home. And it wasn't allowed to bring this flour. So they used a traditional method of preserving this flour in salt and almost disguising it as a food product so that it could be snuck into the menu

• 1:00:15Speaker 01

  and then it could arrive in space like this.

• 1:00:17Alie Ward?

  Oh.

• 1:00:18Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's really beautiful. There's a picture of the astronaut with this floating flower in this sphere, staring, lovingly gazing at it, floating in weightlessness. And then some of this is food diplomacy too. I mean, in the case of Kim Chi, it's, I hope that the astronaut enjoyed it. But I think it's also decisions from these governments and these space agencies to also make a statement and bring culture with intention to the space station.

• 1:00:39Alie Ward?

  Yeah, well, several people wanted to know about equipment. Sean Thomas Kane, Agamemnon, Katrina, Victoria Chaplin, Sheridan Kelly, Caffeine Junkie wanted to know. Katrina asked, how do they heat food in space? Do they have a microwave? That would probably interfere with some sensitive equipment or something, right? Katrina asked. Yeah, Agamemnon said, like, how do they make things hot? Sean wanted to know, do electric or gas stove tops, are they even used in space? Is it all just kind of hot water based?

• 1:01:10Speaker 01

  Good question. Today it is mostly water based. I think there was this old school method. They had this device. It looked like a briefcase, like truly, and you'd open it up, almost like this panini press slash briefcase, where you would put your food inside, had these heat pads, and you would close the briefcase, wait, you know, a minute, open it up and eat your food. Or in the old can days, I think there was even this little hole where you could insert the can and maybe it would heat up around the can. But today it's mostly, mostly water. So no stove tops. No frying, none of those things, sadly.

• 1:01:45Alie Ward?

  So, yes, because there's no gravity to influence the heat rising, cool air settling, and the high-energy draws could like pop a fuse. Ovens have been tough. Also, food floats. There was an experimental zero-g kitchen oven used to bake chocolate chip cookies via kind of a bizarre branding deal with DoubleTree Hotel, but that was experimental. Ovens back on earth. And there are some pouch warmers in use, but for now, nothing very appetizing. Although, once again, that 2024 Deep Space Food Challenge did come up with the prototype of a centrifugal canister oven. And while the name sated, meaning safe, appliance, tidy,

• 1:02:27Alie Ward?

  efficient, and delicious, could have benefited from an artist's collaboration with perhaps a poet or some punch-up from a marketing copywriter, it does mean that humankind took one giant leap toward fresh brownies in space. Not there yet, but we're getting closer. But with the space food race, China recently whipped our asses, releasing a video of astronauts on their Tiangong space station using a new onboard hot air oven, which is like a very advanced and expensive air fryer. They were making chicken wings. They look really good.

• 1:03:05Speaker 01

  I would love a toaster, like pop your toast and then it just floats up into zero-g.

• 1:03:10Alie Ward?

  Yeah, but it's gotta be a tortilla toaster, right?

• 1:03:13Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah, gotta be a tortilla toaster. And then just like little flying discs.

• 1:03:17Alie Ward?

  Kind of like flying saucers, right?

• 1:03:19Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:03:20Alie Ward?

  Lynette Davila, Valby Listening, Curious Nerd wanted to know about hydration. Curious Nerd said, "I've read that astronauts can become easily dehydrated due to fluid shifts and low water content of food and alterations in physical mechanisms of thirst." Lynette wanted to know, "Do they have to drink extra water because so many things are dried?" Or I imagine, too, having to pee in space is like... Not the vibe, you know? Do they have to drink a lot more water?

• 1:03:46Speaker 01

  That's a really good question. I'd want to say yes. It seems logical that they would have to drink more and they are working out a lot and in this confined space. From experience, what I know from like Arctic field work and speaking to a lot of people who do this kind of work as well, like there's a problem with people almost intentionally or subconsciously dehydrating themselves because as you said, like going to the bathroom is so inconvenient that you'll try to avoid it at all costs. So you'll like intentionally not drink water so that you don't have to continuously go through the logistics of peeing.

• 1:04:17Alie Ward?

  Mm hmm. Which brings me to a question I'm happy and proud to ask on behalf of Katrina, Emily Krieger, Jesse Cole, and a few other people. Megan Ratcliffe, Kelly Shaver, and Bopi wanted to know, Bopi said, what comes in must go out. My question is, does the amount and type of waste created go into consideration of food available? Christina wanted to know, does a lack of gravity affect processes like chewing? Let's see, another person asked about peristalsis. But really, like, to put it simply, Emily Krieger wanted to know, pardon my asking, but are cruciferous and other fart inducing foods purposely avoided in space?

• 1:05:00Alie Ward?

  Jesse said, I heard it smells like farts and BO on the ISS. How do they help keep people less gassy?

• 1:05:07Speaker 01

  The menu is very much designed with that in mind. That being said, everyone's body is different. So it's kind of hard to say what's, you know, what makes you fart. Doesn't necessarily make me fart. So it's a little experimental, but the body functions in the same way. When astronauts first went to space, they didn't know if they would even be able to pee or do any of these basic functions. But in fact, muscles and bodies still have their inner mechanics and things go in and come out, as you said. But the toilet, I heard the toilet's always breaking, so they're very sensitive about that. Yeah, it's not good. So plumber, future career space plumber.

• 1:05:46Speaker 01

  With research stations, they always say the most important people are not the scientists. They're the people who can, you know, the plumber, the electrician, the firefighters. And with the space station, they have to be all those people in one.

• 1:05:58Alie Ward?

  Right. They need more Astro tradespeople.

• 1:06:02Speaker 01

  Exactly. Yeah. Trades get a certificate in space trades.

• 1:06:06Alie Ward?

  What about the crumbs? How are they picking those up? They don't have a dust buster out there, right? They have a Dyson.

• 1:06:12Speaker 01

  They do have some kind of crazy vacuum because they use it for shaving. So there's these techniques where you kind of like shave right into the vacuum. And for food, I think it's just try to be clean. You can't have those crumbs. Actually, in my space food helmet, this was a big problem. I didn't think of this. This was a small but large oversight. I had these little, kind of like nerd candies, if you've ever had those. They were these popping, sizzling candies because part of my tasting menu was this champagne ritual of just having that. Or like, you can't crack the cold beer, but can you have this fizzing sensation in your mouth? So I opened this container and then all these tiny little candies floating up. They got in my nose, they got in my ear, they got in my hair.

• 1:06:55Speaker 01

  I was picking them out for days.

• 1:06:58Alie Ward?

  You're like, that's a no go.

• 1:07:00Speaker 01

  Yeah, I was like, none of these. We're not doing this. Very scientific insight.

• 1:07:05Alie Ward?

  You don't know until you try it, right?

• 1:07:07Speaker 01

  Mm hmm. Yeah. What planet would you want to have dinner on if you could go?

• 1:07:12Alie Ward?

  I mean, it definitely has to be a frozen planet. I'm an ice queen. Like, I can't drink a room temperature anything.

• 1:07:19Speaker 01

  Yeah. So you got to pick accordingly.

• 1:07:21Alie Ward?

  I have to pick accordingly.

• 1:07:22Speaker 01

  You got to get your space, Getty.

• 1:07:24Alie Ward?

  Yeah. Just have either that or just like exhaust all the urine cubes from the supply. What about where would you go? Would you need a hot stuff? Would you do a Venus?

• 1:07:35Speaker 01

  I, I'm just, I'm a Saturn. I'm a Saturn person.

• 1:07:38Alie Ward?

  You're a Saturn.

• 1:07:39Speaker 01

  All the way. It's just, I just want those rings. That's all I care about. I don't even care about anything else. I just, I see myself on Saturn, whatever I'm doing. That's where I'll be.

• 1:07:48Alie Ward?

  This is a good question to ask around like the holiday table.

• 1:07:51Speaker 01

  Yeah. Where are you gonna eat?

• 1:07:52Alie Ward?

  Where would you be at? What would you eat?

• 1:07:54Speaker 01

  And Saturn's like, you know, those, like a sushi restaurant where they have the conveyor belts?

• 1:07:58Alie Ward?

  Yes.

• 1:07:59Speaker 01

  That's me on Saturn.

• 1:08:01Alie Ward?

  They're just going by on the rings.

• 1:08:05Alie Ward?

  I love that the ring is the conveyor belt. You would just look off like, ooh, cornflakes.

• 1:08:10Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:08:12Alie Ward?

  What, well, what's the hardest thing about doing this? What is just what bedevils you, vexes you?

• 1:08:19Speaker 01

  I think it's convincing people in certain rooms why something matters. And like getting to the heart of a thing, because sometimes it's just like, is it practical? Is it efficient? Can we be productive? Instead of like, okay, we're humans.

• 1:08:36Alie Ward?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:08:37Speaker 01

  Like, it's so basic, but that's the biggest upwards battle for the work.

• 1:08:41Alie Ward?

  Yeah, is trying to find that Venn diagram of practicality, but also like humanity and enjoying something like reminding yourself you're not a robot.

• 1:08:51Speaker 01

  Right. And it's not that I don't also want to treat space as this frivolous environment and I'm, you know, very intentionally not engaging my work in space tourism contexts.

• 1:09:02Alie Ward?

  Hmm. What happens if Blue Origin is like, we're doing five, six hour, five day, week long trips? And they knock on your door to make it fancy as hell?

• 1:09:16Speaker 01

  Not from Blue Origin, but I've had, I have had many knocks on my door. And it's been tricky. For example, in one case, I had someone call me. Their job was astronaut sales. If you can believe it, that was their email signature. And their job was to profile top billionaires around the world to try to figure out of these people, like, do they race cars? Are they skydiving? How do they spend their money? Would they potentially be the profile of a person who might buy a ticket on such flights? And they thought, yes, wow. And they thought that this is a family decision. It's going to cost a lot of money. It's risky. You know, if you have kids or a partner, you're probably going to have to let them know and they might weigh in.

• 1:10:01Alie Ward?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:10:01Speaker 01

  I was making a space food cookbook at the time that was speculative. And they wanted to purchase this book and use this book as part of their sales package to send to the partner and kids of these people to say like, look what your parent is doing space. Look what they're going to get to eat in space. And that was not for me personally. I've collaborated with lots of chefs and I thought, you know, sometimes I think we're working together on these scientific goals. And then finding out later that in fact, this person wanted to open a restaurant in space and quite serious about it. And so we kind of have to like backpedal a little bit like, oh, we're, I didn't realize we were having very different conversations.

• 1:10:40Alie Ward?

  Yeah. I'm sure it's really a weird time to see. You know, innovation and industry and this really, really big wealth disparity and who has access to things like this, the division between a kind of science and vanity is really interesting, you know?

• 1:10:58Speaker 01

  And that people can do these things. It's not, you know, this job of astronaut sales is an actual legitimate career path now.

• 1:11:07Alie Ward?

  Right, yeah.

• 1:11:08Speaker 01

  And you have to pinch yourself like, am I sitting in this room right now? But yeah, indeed, we are.

• 1:11:13Alie Ward?

  What's the thing that gets you most excited about it? Like, what just always gives you butterflies as a researcher and an artist?

• 1:11:21Speaker 01

  I love whimsy, and I think space has so much potential for being whimsical and being imaginative and just stretching my mind in ways that I didn't think were possible. So that that's really exciting in terms of process and then more on like a deeper mission level. I think it's the potential to, and I do this, you know, on earth as well, as I, as I am a nurse, as I am a nurse, like on my day to day when I'm not dreaming. And like, working with scientists and field workers to think about different ways to ask these questions, different ways of integrating knowledge and seeing what that leads to is also very exciting.

• 1:12:03Speaker 01

  I've had some fun experiences, that's for sure. And they, they continue to surprise me every day.

• 1:12:09Alie Ward?

  And it must be fun going out to eat with you because you're probably not someone who just will sit down while they're looking at their phone, right? Like, are you always the friend that's like, we have to try this place. They're doing something interesting over here. This is a hidden gem in a strip mall. Are you that friend?

• 1:12:25Speaker 01

  I am that friend, but I, I don't know. I think for me, it's more like what's happening in the home. So I like going out to restaurants. It's always exciting, but I'm equally excited. I've been like this since I was a kid. Like, I loved getting invited to my friends' houses and meeting their grandparents and just seeing how somebody makes their toast. How do you make your tea? How do you cut your lemon? Like, there's no right or wrong way to do something, but it's always telling something about that person.

• 1:12:49Alie Ward?

  Yeah, it's such a, it's such a personal and immediate type of anthropology, you know? For sure. I cook very differently when I'm alone versus when someone else is watching.

• 1:13:00Speaker 01

  Yeah. I don't wash my vegetables.

• 1:13:02Alie Ward?

  Yeah, like, it's good for the microbiome.

• 1:13:04Speaker 01

  Don't worry about it.

• 1:13:05Alie Ward?

  Yeah, exactly. I microwave vegetables that are so soggy. And if I'm tired and hungry enough, I'm like, I would never serve these, but I will serve them to my own mouth. Exactly. So I totally get it. Thank you so much for taking the time to let me ask you so many spacey questions. Thank you. This has been such a pleasure.

• 1:13:27Alie Ward?

  So ask spectacular people spacey questions because the information is just floating around, is ready to be consumed. Thank you so much, Maggie, for joining and chatting. And for more on her work, you can see Maggie Koblens and follow her online at Maggie Koblens. And we're at Ologies on Blue Sky and Instagram. I'm Ally Ward on both. And we have shorter, kid-friendly episodes called Smologies, S-M-O-L-O-G-I-E-S, wherever you get podcasts. So download a bunch for your upcoming holiday road trips. Tell your friends. Ologies merch is at ologiesmerch.com. You can become a patron at patreon.com/ologies. Again, the link to donate to your favorite charity and a highly effective global one is givedirectly.org/ologies. We'll link it in the show notes.

• 1:14:12Alie Ward?

  Erin Talbert admins the Ologies Podcast Facebook group. Avliel Malick makes our professional transcripts. Kelly Ardwire does the website. Noelle Dilworth keeps us down to earth as a scheduling producer. Susan Hale is our space operations commander as managing director. Susan also did an incredible amount of backup research for this episode. Huge thank you to Susan Hale. Couldn't have done this one without her. Couldn't have done any of them without her. And co-pilot editor is Jake Chaffee. And driving the editing shuttle is Mercedes Maitland of Maitland Audio. Nick Thorburn banged out the theme song. And if you stick around till the end of the episode, I tell you a secret. This week's, it's that I could not be less interested in going to space. So consider a slot open.

• 1:14:54Alie Ward?

  First, NASA would have me fill out like the most preliminary survey. One of the questions would be like, how much do you have to pee? And I'd have to check the box like all the time. Secondly, once again, I am unqualified and I would never pass the psych tests or the drug tests, if I'm being honest. Hee gummy before Thanksgiving. But my secret, my other secret is I'm going to try this rehydrated ice cream sandwich. I've had it soaking as I've been recording. And don't worry, I'm going to cut out any sounds of eating. All right? I got you. I'm going to try this out, though, right now.

• 1:15:28Alie Ward?

  That's actually not that bad. I'm being honessed with you. Completely honest. It just tastes like a melted ice cream sandwich. Wow, how about that? It tastes like when you make ice cream soup. I think I also put a little bit too much room temperature water. Not optimal. Use less water. You put this in the fridge. Really not that bad. And it doesn't hurt your teeth like eating Styrofoam. So if you have astronaut ice cream sitting in your cabinet and you feel bad throwing it away because it was a gift, pour a little hot water on that. Let it chill in the fridge. You got yourself a medium cold ice cream sandwich. Good to know. Okay, bye bye. Pachydermatology, homeology, cryptozoology, lithology, nanotechnology, meteorology, geology, nephology,

• 1:16:12Alie Ward?

  seriology, cellology.

• 1:16:22Alie Ward?

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