Specially-prepared foodstuffs supply an astronaut with a diet containing his basic nutritional requirements in a form that is useful in his enironment. Several edible coatings preserve foods and give loose foods form and firmness. These coatings aid in packaging and give the food slip for easy removal from the package

Cope, P. S.

Larson, R. W.

English

NASA Technical Reports Server

August 1968
	
Brief 68-10324 
NASA TECH BRIEF U 
NASA Tech Briefs are issued to summarize specific innovations derived from the U.S. space program, 
to encourage their commercial application. Copies are available to the public at 15 cents each 
from the Clearinghouse for Federal Scientific and Technical Information, Springfield, Virginia 22151. 
Food Products for Space Applications 
	
In the exploration of space, nutritional problems 	 peach and cottage cheese. 
	
take on an importance quite unrelated to those en-	 use, but in dry comminuted 
	
countered on earth. The environment, which is essen- 	 pea soup, cream of tomato 
tially a complete vacuum plus being almost entirely 
free of gravitational forces, denies the use of many 
conventional terrestrial foodstuffs and imposes un-
usual practices upon an astronaut attempting to use 
specialty foods. As an example, dry cereal cannot be 
poured from a container into a bowl since there is no 
gravitational force to cause it to pour nor to remain 
in the bowl, for that matter. 
With these considerations in mind, a family of 
specially-prepared foodstuffs has been "designed" to 
supply the astronaut with a diet containing his basic 
nutritional requirements in a form that is useful in his 
environment. In addition, several edible coatings have 
been developed to preserve certain foods and to give 
"loose" foods form and firmness. These coatings aid 
in packaging by excluding air and also give the food 
"slip" for easy removal from the package in a weight-
less situation. 
Items "designed" in this manner are cubes of cheese 
cake, custard, sugar cookie, plus bars of a mixture of
Category 04 
Also prepared for space 
form, are corn chowder, 
soup, and whole milk. 
Notes: 
1. Persons or organizations faced with long-term food 
storage and/or packaging problems should find 
these processes useful. 
2. Inquiries concerning this innovation may be di-
rected to:
Technology Utilization Officer 
Manned Spacecraft Center 
Houston, Texas 77058 
Reference: B68-10324 
Patent status: 
No patent action is contemplated by NASA. 
Source: Patricia S. Cope and Robert W. Larson 
of The Whirlpool Corporation 
under contract to 
Manned Spacecraft Center 
(MSC-11697, 11698, 11699) 
This document was prepared under the sponsorship of the National 
Aeronautics and Space Administration. Neither the United States 
Government nor any person acting on behalf of the United States
Government assumes any liability resulting from the use of the 
information contained in this document, or warrants that such use 
will be free from privately owned rights.
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Food products for space applications

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