July 20, 1969. You probably remember exactly where you were. Most of us do. Neil Armstrong stepped onto the Moon, and the world held its breath.
What you might not remember is what he had for breakfast that morning.
It turns out, feeding three men on a journey to the Moon and back was one of the quieter engineering challenges of the whole Apollo 11 mission. And the answers are a little surprising.
A Good Breakfast Before Blastoff
Before Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, and Michael Collins ever left the ground on July 16, they sat down to a proper breakfast on Earth. Starting in 1961, every astronaut had a substantial meal before launch. That was the last normal eating they would do for eight days.
Once the mission was underway, everything changed. Meals were carefully planned to make sure each astronaut got 2,800 calories a day. Not a morsel was left to chance.
The Freeze-Dried Menu
Most of what the crew ate was freeze-dried. That was the only way to keep food fresh, preserve nutrients, and keep things light enough to carry into space.
One of the daily meals was freeze-dried chicken with rice and sauce, sealed in an airtight plastic bag and wrapped in laminated film to lock in flavor. The National Air and Space Museum still holds one of those original packages in its collection.
Other items on the menu included fruit cake, cubes of barbecued beef, and, in a small but notable first, hot dogs. Apollo 11 was the first space mission where the crew could eat hot dogs in orbit.
The First Meal Ever Eaten on the Moon
Here is the detail that never fails to delight people. The very first meal eaten on the surface of the Moon consisted of bacon cubes, sugar cookies in cube form, peaches, coffee, and a pineapple-grapefruit soft drink.
Bacon. On the Moon. You have to appreciate that.
After Splashdown: Quarantine Cooking
When the crew splashed down on July 24 and returned to Earth, their unusual eating was not quite over. They went straight into a 21-day quarantine to make sure they had not brought any harmful bacteria back with them.
Menus from that quarantine period still survive, including one signed by Buzz Aldrin. While more limited than a regular restaurant menu, those meals did allow the astronauts to enjoy things they could not eat in space, like soup.
Even today, some things remain off the menu for astronauts heading into space, just as they were in 1969. Alcohol and anything perishable are still not permitted, to protect the crew’s health while they are far from home.
So the next time you sit down to a bowl of soup or a proper hot breakfast, you might spare a thought for three men who once ate bacon cubes on the Moon and called it a meal.
