Nutrition and Space

         I was reading chapter fifteen, Discomfort Food; that talks about the different types of food that they have for space travel and the reasons behind it. It all started when one astronaut brought a corned beef sandwich with them into to space as a surprise for the other astronaut. The sandwich literally was crumbling into tiny pieces and they tried to hide it. This incident caused a lot of problems for NASA. There were formal manufacturing regulations to follow when it came to nutrition and this sandwich broke several of them. NASA now has dehydrated, compacted meals for their astronauts. “Over the years, recruits survived on all manner of processed and regimented aerospace foods: cubes, rods, slurries, bars, powders, and “rehydratables”.”(Roach, 290). This is the kind of food that the astronauts had to live off of. Most of the meat always comes back. The chapter also talks about a nutritionist that provided all these recruits with adequate requirements for a healthy lifestyle. It’s interesting how they come up with the idea of food in space and to keep it somewhat appetizing to those who must consume it. I liked how at the very beginning of the chapter the author uses humor by saying,” When Veterinarians make dinner, and…” (Roach, 281). I found the chapter very interesting and I even learned a few things that I had no clue about.