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Astronaut ration at the huntsville space and rocket museum
Posted: Wed Jul 27, 2022 10:01 am
by purpkoolaid
We need to get steve to eat this stuff.
Astronaut Rations
Posted: Thu Jul 28, 2022 8:28 am
by Tedster
Charlie Duke, of Apollo 16 fame, was born in North Carolina. Consequently he learned to like eating grits. He took his cuisine with him on to his time at NASA. Somehow, he talked the space flight nutritionist into including specially prepared grits onto the flight menu. Fellow crew members John Young and Ken Mattingly both hated grits.
"You gonna eat those grits, John?"
"No!"
"Good..."
In an interview he said it was the first time, and maybe the last, anybody ate grits in space. John Young famously brought along a corned beef sandwich from a local deli on an earlier Gemini flight. He nonchalantly pulled that out of his pocket in orbit, promoting Gus Grissom to exclaim "Where did you get that?!" Space food was nutritious, but it wasn't all that tasty.
Early on the experts at NASA determined that, since coffee has no nutritional value, no calories, it was not necessary for space flight and therefore not included on spaceflights. Wally Schirra, an old Navy hand, knew better and made sure that the section at NASA responsible for the coffee prohibition had their java at work cut off. They soon rescinded that policy, and coffee was included on all the flights.
Re: Astronaut Rations
Posted: Thu Jul 28, 2022 6:44 pm
by Amelieee1
Tedster wrote: ↑Thu Jul 28, 2022 8:28 am
Charlie Duke, of Apollo 16 fame, was born in North Carolina. Consequently he learned to like eating grits. He took his cuisine with him on to his time at NASA. Somehow, he talked the space flight nutritionist into including specially prepared grits onto the flight menu. Fellow crew members John Young and Ken Mattingly both hated grits.
"You gonna eat those grits, John?"
"No!"
"Good..."
In an interview he said it was the first time, and maybe the last, anybody ate grits in space. John Young famously brought along a corned beef sandwich from a local deli on an earlier Gemini flight. He nonchalantly pulled that out of his pocket in orbit, promoting Gus Grissom to exclaim "Where did you get that?!" Space food was nutritious, but it wasn't all that tasty.
Early on the experts at NASA determined that, since coffee has no nutritional value, no calories, it was not necessary for space flight and therefore not included on spaceflights. Wally Schirra, an old Navy hand, knew better and made sure that the section at NASA responsible for the coffee prohibition had their java at work cut off. They soon rescinded
that policy, and coffee was included on all the flights.
Amazing stories man!
Re: Astronaut Rations
Posted: Sat Sep 03, 2022 3:42 am
by GunnarTheFeisty
Tedster wrote: ↑Thu Jul 28, 2022 8:28 am
Charlie Duke, of Apollo 16 fame, was born in North Carolina. Consequently he learned to like eating grits. He took his cuisine with him on to his time at NASA. Somehow, he talked the space flight nutritionist into including specially prepared grits onto the flight menu. Fellow crew members John Young and Ken Mattingly both hated grits.
"You gonna eat those grits, John?"
"No!"
"Good..."
In an interview he said it was the first time, and maybe the last, anybody ate grits in space. John Young famously brought along a corned beef sandwich from a local deli on an earlier Gemini flight. He nonchalantly pulled that out of his pocket in orbit, promoting Gus Grissom to exclaim "Where did you get that?!" Space food was nutritious, but it wasn't all that tasty.
Early on the experts at NASA determined that, since coffee has no nutritional value, no calories, it was not necessary for space flight and therefore not included on spaceflights. Wally Schirra, an old Navy hand, knew better and made sure that the section at NASA responsible for the coffee prohibition had their java at work cut off. They soon rescinded
that policy, and coffee was included on all the flights.
Heh, I remember reading the sandwich story. Ground control was fairly pissed. The sandwich was, apparently, quite good.
Astronaut ration at Huntsville
Posted: Sat Sep 03, 2022 1:07 pm
by Tedster
Yeah, it turned out to be kind of a big deal as such things go, and he got into some trouble. For one thing they were spending a lot of money on the space program, in those days they actually passed budgets and had to get money from taxpayers, and any bad publicity whatsoever, of any kind, was considered a potential career ender. They were all living in a fishbowl on and off duty, and some of the usual suspects in congress were always looking for any excuse to axe the program.
There was always some concern about small particles floating around in a weightless environment and getting lodged in electrical switches or ingested into environmental filters, things like that. I'm sure the situation was overblown like everything else tends to be, and John Young was such a great pilot they didn't let it get in the way of his career.