Appliances in Space 2: Mission to Mars!

July 23rd, 2012

Appliance Talk

Isn’t it annoying when you’re all psyched to start making dinner, then you realise that there’s no food in the house?  Then you’ve got to waste a bunch of time heading down to the shops to buy what your need – time that could be spent cooking and eating.

Well, what if the nearest shops were around 225 million kilometres away?  And reaching them would involve six months of travel time through the infinite vacuum of space?

This is the exact situation that the boffins over at NASA are trying to avoid by thoroughly planning how they would feed and care for a team of astronauts on a theoretical mission to Mars.

Life in the Big Black

In our last look at Appliances In Space, we learned all about recycling urine into drinking water, over-spicing food to counteract the loss of smell and taste in zero gravity, inventing physics-defying coffee mugs and putting on a fresh pair of shorts every three days.

These conditions may sound pretty extreme to us, but for astronauts, they’re relatively luxurious.  After all, the International Space Station receives regular supply shuttles every six months or so to keep things fresh and provide a bit of variety.

For interplanetary astronauts though, this would not be a practical option.  With a minimum travel time of six months just to reach Mars, followed by 18 months of planetside exploration, then another six months of travel to get home again, sending supply shuttles after the mission would take just as much organisation as the mission itself.

This means that the crew will need to bring its entire food supply with them – enough to last for two and a half years!

And you thought planning your household food budget was complicated…

Variety is the spice of space

On such a long trip, packing a variety of foods to avoid monotony in the diet is essential.

We all know that keeping a chest freezer out in the garage can let you store a good supply of food to keep your household well-fed for longer, but imagine if it was filled entirely with sausages.  You could probably live on this for quite a while, but you’d be running the risk of dying from malnutrition or succumbing to some kind of ‘sausage madness’ from lack of choice.

Fortunately (or possibly unfortunately) for the astronauts, sausage wouldn’t be an option on the Mars menu, as it will have to be entirely vegetarian – properly storing meat in zero gravity isn’t really practical, and neither is bringing edible animals along for the ride (Pigs in Space will have to wait).

About 100 vegetarian recipes have been planned so far by the NASA team, using plenty of tofu and nuts to provide protein.  One standout dish is a Thai pizza that replaces cheese with carrots, red peppers, mushrooms, scallions, peanuts and a homemade sauce that offers a “spicy kick”.  If they need an an ILVE pizza oven to cook it in, they can just visit our website…

Once the crew get to Mars, a few more food options will become available.  As Mars has a certain degree of gravity, the crew could use a hydroponic farm to grow their own fruits and vegetables, further supplementing their diet while going where no-one has gone before.

Space chef wanted – apply in 20 years

If you’ve got kids that are keen home cooks, start training them now – NASA plans to have one crew member take responsibility for managing the crew’s meals and nutrition, essentially serving as the mission chef.  And with no manned missions to Mars likely until at least 2030, there’s still plenty of time for them to practice.