What the First Astronauts Ate - Food in Space

CORRECTION! John Glenn was the first American to orbit the Earth, Alan Shepard was the first American to get to space. Thanks to Factor for sponsoring this video: Use code TASTINGHISTORY50 to get 50% OFF your first Factor box plus 20% off your next box at bit.ly/47TL1yd!

That reminds me of a sci fi convention where my sister was in charge of the hospitality (snacks and such). As we had no money for soda, we made a big industrial sized jug of Tang. Since it was the year Glenn went back to space, we covered our impoverished butts by calling it "The John Glenn Celebratory Tang Toast"

One dude invented Tang, Cool Whip, and Pop Rocks. William A. Mitchell you legend.

Speaking of the flavor of Tang: when my brother served in Vietnam, he asked our mother to send Tang because the water didn't taste good and he needed something to mask it.

Hello, Max. I can add a little to your story. I studied food, nutrition and dietetics at UC Berkeley from 1970-1975, and this subject came up. Our professors helped determine what astronauts (and soldiers) needed and the specifications were turned over to the food scientists. Berkeley's recommendation was to send orange juice which was served at most American breakfast tables. However, it did not reconstitute in zero gravity. Tang was chosen because it was similar to orange juice and mixed easily in space. For years after, nutritionists had to counter the idea that Tang and orange juice were equally nutritious. Tang was astronaut food, for technical reasons, but, it does not have the same nutritional benefits of real juice.

I absolutely love the hoops that Max goes through to include the Hardtack joke in as many episodes as possible. Please never stop this.

When I was in high school, we had an astronaut come to the school and give a talk about the space program. After the address, he took questions, and someone asked if they really used Tang. I will never forget his reply. "Unfortunately." 🤣

The “Tang” face needs to be a stock clip going forward when Max encounters anything particularly sour/tangy 😂

When I was a kid, my grandmother would make us “Russian tea.” It was a mix of Tang, lemonade powder, ice tea powder, sugar, cinnamon, and whole cloves you would add hot water to. I believe it is a twisted take on the Russian custom to serve tea with lemon. It is something I enjoy even now when I want something hot but fruity in the winter!

13:03 like carcinization (all animals eventually evolve into crabs), all travel food evolves into hardtack

There are only two options of Tang dilution in any given glass of water: 1. the shadow of an orange passed over this glass an hour ago, 2. holy ascorbic acid frag grenade!!

I'm 57 and we drank MASSIVE amounts of Tang as kids . Along with various powdered chocolate, strawberry and malted milk . Or soda. I honestly dont think I drank any water except the occasional 5 gulps from a hot garden hose during the summer .

Really curious how many people see his pokemon plushies and realize how smart he his with each choice for each episode. This one is pretty simple, but he's always so methodical and persistent with this little Easter egg that he never brings any attention too. I love this so much

Holy crap. This could lead to the weirdest collaboration video ever: Tasting History + the Hydraulic Press channel = potential banana Space-Cereal.

I never had Tang pie, but my aunt used to make what she called "Chemical Pie" using bottled lime and lemon juice and sweetened condensed milk in a graham cracker crust. The acid in the citrus juice polymerized the milk proteins, and that's all there was to it.

This is so hilarious to me because Tang is part of every Filipino kid's childhood. It's marketed as an easy to prepare and "vitamin loaded" drink for those hot summer days (which these days is practically every day). Their ads are iconic for their soundbite of a spoon hitting a pitcher of the juice three times, which summons said children to come enjoy an icy glass of the stuff. We think of it much in the same way as Americans think of Kool-Aid. And yet this is the first time I've heard of it being made into pie... though if I were to be honest I definitely see some Filipino attempting this lol. I'd love to see this being made with the other flavors of Tang we have here- coz we have a LOT of 'em, some of them are pretty new too coz I never saw them growing up. Honey lemon Tang pie, anyone? 😂

I like that Max didn't just say this is gross, he said more like "I don't like this, but if you like key lime pie You might like it." Tang is tangy. . .

Tang may be the astronaut's drink but we all know that prune juice is a warrior's drink

8:55, back in like 2007 I got to go to a “Lunch with an astronaut” at Kennedy Space Center, and the two astronauts there were John Young and Charlie Duke. They get to the Q&A portion and this old guy gets the microphone and asks “How did you get that corned beef sandwich past me?” The gentleman was none other than Gunter Wendt, an engineer that would strap the astronauts into their seats. It was probably the most interesting interaction I’ve ever seen. Edit: Ok here’s how he did it, there was an accomplice, Wally Schirra, had picked up the sandwich and slipped it to Young after he had been suited up, it was tucked in a pocket in his pressure suit and since he had already been approved by the other technicians suiting him up Wendt was none the wiser.

19:01 They carried a whole lemon and onion (which were then divided into 3 parts each). According to the rules of the Soviet space program, all food had to be pre-ground or cooked so that there was no splashing or cracking into small pieces in space that could get into electronics or somewhere else. The cosmonauts were simply pleased to eat something with a structure that can be chewed, and not just swallowed