After a long 10 days in space following a launch from Kennedy Space Center on April 1, the astronauts of Artemis II are finally returning to earth. This mission involved the testing of the new Orion spacecraft in a flyby around the moon.
The crew’s accomplishments will mark the first human trip beyond low Earth orbit since 1972, and set up the human race for all future lunar-related missions. But putting that aside, we can get into what people actually care about: what are the astronauts eating?
What are the Artemis II astronauts eating?
Surprisingly, the menu for the Artemis II mission has a lot more variety than one might expect. In an official image released by NASA, it was revealed that the crew actually had 189 different options for unique food items. This list included different beverages, meals, snacks, seasonings, and even condiments to satisfy the astronauts’ cravings.
The most popular drinks were not very expected with coffee and green tea reigning supreme. Other drinks included a mango-peach smoothie, lemonade, and apple cider.
The most popular food was a little unexpected with tortillas coming out on top. According to NASA food scientists, the tortillas are typically very popular as they are able to eat right out of the wrapper and provide quick fuel while not distributing as many crumbs as other breads might. Other food items on the menu included various dehydrated meals similar to ones that you may take on long camping trips. Astronauts could choose from vegetable quiche, mango salad, macaroni and cheese, spicy green beans, and even barbecued beef brisket.
Most importantly though, a 10-day trip to outer space could not be complete without a good selection of snacks. The crew were supplied with a wide variety of different nuts, candies, and cookies for their trip. Even in space, humans can not escape the cravings for a sweet treat.
Some more items released by NASA included five different hot sauces, multiple Canadian items like maple syrup and maple cookies for Canadian mission specialist Jeremy Hansen, and a jar of Nutella that created a viral moment after it was caught on camera floating cinematically throughout the spacecraft.
Overall, it seems that while the menu for the Artemis II crew is not necessarily fine dining, it’s a surprisingly broad and inclusive list of different foods to make their trip as comfortable as possible. Tomorrow, the four astronauts aboard plan to land in the Pacific Ocean around 8 p.m. EDT. We can only thank them for their bravery as they make record-breaking discoveries that will redesign space travel forever, and of course, we must also thank the hardworking food scientists at NASA for designing the menu that fuels them.