Life's little questions

[Kloster]

5 hours ago, Zit said:

many years ago a French guy invented food boxes with 2 compartments containing some chemical stuff. You just had to fold it, it broke the separation between these two compartments and both products mixed and reacted together, producing enough heat to warm up the food at about 70° (Joerg can probably give some details as a chemister). Get your warm cassoulet in space ! It had to be invented by a French. But I'm not sure it has been at last implemented.

Yes, I used that while in the army 30 years ago. Having a hot meal readily available while a mountain trek was really enjoyable. And the food was correct. For army food, it was exceptionally good. At least, this is what our foreign students told me.

4 hours ago, Joerg said:

Not sure about the process actually used in that product, but many kinds of calcinated (dehydrated) salt will heat up when coming into contact with water again. For presenting this effect I would probably use water-free calcium chloride as that has no toxic or even noxious components. You'll just have to adjust the amount of salt to the amount of heat you want.

That was this: Water that once the compartments were broken, was mixed with calcium-something.

[Joerg]

2 minutes ago, Kloster said:

That was this: Water that once the compartments were broken, was mixed with calcium-something.

Also works with calcinated limestone - if you add some oil and a couple of logs above, you can start a fire that way. The run-off is rather caustic, however, and can turn you into soap. Well, precipitated chalk soap, but you wouldn't appreciate the difference much.

Another possibility is to use powdered calcinated zeolith. Same effect, less clumping, and lower reconstitution temperatures.

[soltakss]

Don't forget that you cannot toss a pancake properly in Zero-G, either.

[seneschal]

Reminds me of the challenges faced by the inhabitants of Sealab, which I researched a couple years ago.  Air pressure (and its composition) also affects what and how enclosed voyagers can cook.  Tinned and microwavable stuff (and NO SMOKING!).

[g33k]

On 1/11/2020 at 11:01 AM, soltakss said:

Don't forget that you cannot toss a pancake properly in Zero-G, either.

I imagine one could loosen the pancake, then toss it in any given direction (zero G, all directions equal), and quickly move the pan 'round to catch the 'cake; the raw dough should adhere to the hot surface, at least moderately well, and you return the pan to the heat.  It'd probably take some practice, but should be do'able.

Of course, pancakes have this "bubbles rise" effect that you won't get in zero G, but I think most of the cooking there is conductive rather than convective, so pancakes may still work OK.  Sort of.

Waffles would probably do better, with the simultaneous 2-sided cooking...

Edited January 31, 2020 by g33k

[olskool]

On 1/11/2020 at 2:01 PM, soltakss said:

Don't forget that you cannot toss a pancake properly in Zero-G, either.

How would you even pour the batter without it spreading out into a giant cloud of floating liquid? 

This is why the US space program gave the original space crews food in tubes resembling toothpaste tubes.  Just squeeze it into your mouth and you are good to go.  you can still get budget cheeze spread in those old tubes.  It tastes funky unlike real cheese, but it is still out there.      

[Joerg]

24 minutes ago, olskool said:

How would you even pour the batter without it spreading out into a giant cloud of floating liquid? 

From something resembling a toothpaste tube directly onto the heated surface, or possibly between both surfaces.

If you do live cooking, you'd create a rectangular film of batter - possibly like a soap bubble before blowing - and then capture it beween the two hot irons.

Although transferring the batter into one of those might be a trick in itself. Perhaps you would want a syrinx-like mixer with a sluice to enter the ingredients, possibly inside a glovebox to avoid contaminating the entire kitchen with spills. Possibly using freeze-dried ingredients, mixed with recycled water.

Alternatively, you could have a rotating capsule with a counterweight (another teleoperated microgravity environment) and remote-operated manipulators, doing your cuisine in rotational microgravity much like a surgeon manipulates his instruments in minimally invasive operations. Taste-checking will be somewhat tricky, as you'd have to fill a syringe with a sample, send it up the arm holding out the kitchen and then into the area where the cook teleoperates the kitchen. Smell samples may be easier.

24 minutes ago, olskool said:

This is why the US space program gave the original space crews food in tubes resembling toothpaste tubes.  Just squeeze it into your mouth and you are good to go.  you can still get budget cheeze spread in those old tubes.  It tastes funky unlike real cheese, but it is still out there.      

Closed environment cuisine will be somewhat different anyway. You'll either opt to avoid sulphur-rich foodstuff, or implant microbes or nanites into your colon that deal with noxious gases.

I wonder how well the gas-liquid separation will work in the absence of gravity, anyway.

 

Sense of taste may be altered, especially if sense of smell has been affected by the background smells. You might be forced to wear some sort of bubble helmet glovebox in order to isolate the odors of your environment from those of your food, and vice versa.

 

Air liquefication might be the solution to remove evaporated aroma substances, but that won't affect stuff that sits on surfaces and gives off a certain steam pressure. But then, it might be possible to evacuate sections of your habitat, and/or "wash" them with pure oxygen that (in combination with the silver mesh in the surface material) will purify those surfaces.

[Darius West]

On 1/7/2020 at 8:14 AM, Qizilbashwoman said:

And the actress, Aghdashloo, is Iranian Turkmen, and I want to have her babies even though she is a quarter-century older than me. Oh my god that voice

I think she's my favorite character in the Expanse.  I was very interested in where the developments of Season 4 will take her. Can't say much as spoilers aren't nice.

Edited February 3, 2020 by Darius West

[Qizilbashwoman]

9 hours ago, Darius West said:

I think she's my favorite character in the Expanse.  I was very interested in where the developments of Season 4 will take her. Can't say much as spoilers aren't nice.

you mean season 5? season 4 just ended, didn't it?

[Darius West]

13 hours ago, Qizilbashwoman said:

you mean season 5? season 4 just ended, didn't it?

I was pointing to the developments of season 4 for her character.  So yes, where will those season 4 developments take Chrisjen Avasarala in season 5 ?