This American Staple Was The Very First Vegetable Grown In Outer Space

Humanity has dreamed of conquering space since time immemorial, but it wasn't until the 20th century that this became an actual possibility. Once the Space Race was in full throttle, scientists began asking themselves which foods could be grown outside of Earth. After all, it would be useless to build the technology that would allow us to get to Mars if we can't feed the crews that get there. Since the 1960s, one food has consistently come up as one of the best candidates for reaching the soil of other planets — and it's something you likely have in your kitchen right now: potatoes.

Domesticated by Andean cultures in South America around 7,000 years ago, potatoes were brought to other continents after European colonization. They've become a staple food in places like Ireland and Idaho, a state mostly known for providing the U.S. with its best taters. In 1995, they became the first food grown in space. The experiment consisted of a team of scientists separating leaves from a single plant, planting them in portable beds and keeping half on Earth while half went up to the stars. The team wanted to see how the difference in conditions would affect the spuds. Surprisingly, the astronaut potatoes and their Earthling counterparts were pretty much the same. 

Since then, scientists have continued to study potatoes' ability to grow in space, even setting up experiments with the arid soil of Peru's Pampas de La Joya desert, which is said to imitate that of Mars.

The reason that potatoes have gotten so much attention from space scientists is that they have many qualities that would make them perfect space food. They pack a lot of carbs and provide vitamins and protein. Compared to other crops, they're also relatively easy to grow and don't require much processing after harvesting. The one big issue that this food presents is that it needs to be cooked in order to taste good. This makes it ineligible for feeding astronauts in current missions, since spaceships don't have stoves or ovens (yet).

For now, potatoes are relegated into food that we hope to grow on other planets one day. Still, there are several other crops that we are currently growing in stations outside of Earth. These are mostly fresh salad greens that, unlike potatoes, don't need to be cooked and can better fulfill our immediate needs (though they also aren't as nutritious). In fact, red romaine lettuce earned the title of the first food grown and harvested in outer space in 2015. 

Food experimentation has grown along with space technology. Scientists are getting increasingly creative with their experiments. In 2021, we sent bottles of Bordeaux wine out into the cosmos to see what would happen. Sommeliers agreed that the wine had aged more rapidly than it would've on Earth. There's even a project that seeks to turn astronauts' breath into yeast. Food might be at the very center of the next space race.