Great Moments in Space Food: The Great Space Burrito Incident

When Salsa Goes Rogue on the ISS

Welcome back to Great Moments in Space Food, the series where we celebrate every time humanity tried to eat like civilized people 250 miles above Earth… and physics said “lol, no…”

Today’s victim: the humble space burrito.

It was 2013. Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield, the guy who made zero-g guitar covers go viral, decided it was time to upgrade from freeze-dried mystery packets. With help from celebrity chef Traci Des Jardins, he whipped up what might be the most ambitious meal ever attempted in orbit: a proper burrito.

Tortilla? Check. Space tortillas are basically indestructible and crumb-free, unlike that traitor known as bread. (See The Corned Beef Sandwich incident of Gemini 3 )

Beans and rice? Vacuum-packed and ready.

We’ll stick a beef stick in there for that authentic “I’m in space but still want flavor” vibe.

Hot sauce? Oh yes. Because if you’re eating in space, you might as well make your taste buds work overtime. That’s why there’s a least 12 different hot sauces on the ISS.

Hadfield floats into the ISS kitchen. ( more like the place with the most velcro on walls in the station) and assembles his masterpiece, and takes a proud bite.

That’s when the salsa decided to unionize…

In zero-g, liquid doesn’t stay where you put it. It was one little wrong squeeze of the hot-sauce packet and — whoosh — a rogue glob of salsa launches like a tiny red comet. It tumbles. It spins. It splatters across the air like modern art nobody asked for. Suddenly the entire crew is doing the “zero-g salsa dodge”, chasing spicy droplets with napkins, vacuums, and the quiet desperation of people who know one floating chili flake could clog a $10 million fan.

Mission Control probably just sighed and added another line to the “never again” list.

This wasn’t some one-off prank. Burritos became a thing on the ISS precisely because tortillas don’t crumble like bread (floating crumbs are basically station-killing glitter). But salsa? Salsa has other plans. One moment you’re enjoying a taste of Earth; the next you’re living in a spicy snow globe.

And that’s the running theme of space food: everything wants to escape. Food floats. Liquids glob. Even the “fresh” stuff from Veggie experiments sometimes decides to go full avant-garde abstract sculpture instead of dinner.

Astronauts still ate the burrito. Because when you’re up there, you take your wins where you can get them — even if half the filling is now decorating the ceiling.

But here’s the part that makes us at Gastronaut grind our teeth: every one of these burrito betrayals, every floating salsa incident, every “why is my dinner trying to assassinate me” moment is completely preventable with the right tech.

That’s why we built ORCA.

Our little 0.24 m² octagonal drum doesn’t just grow the greens. It spins them at 0.5g so the plants remember which way is down. It automates the harvest so no one has to chase rogue kale at 3 a.m. And when those greens finally make it into your space burrito? They actually deliver real nutrition instead of the sad, microgravity-depleted version that usually shows up.

No more salsa rebellions. No more tentacle potatoes. Just real crunch, real flavor, and zero cleanup crews required.

The stars are harsh enough. Your dinner doesn’t have to be.

See you next month for another delicious disaster.

The Gastronaut Crew