Freeze-dried ice cream

Ice cream with its water removed by freeze-drying

Freeze-dried ice cream, also called astronaut ice cream or space ice cream, is ice cream that has had most of the water removed from it by a freeze-drying process. Compared to regular ice cream, it can be kept at room temperature without melting, is dry and more brittle and rigid, but still soft when bitten into. It was developed by Whirlpool Corporation under contract to NASA for the Apollo missions. However, it was not used on any Apollo mission. Freeze-dried foods were developed so that foods could be sent on long-duration spaceflights, and to reduce the weight of the water and oxygen normally found in food. The process of freeze-drying also eliminates the possibility of food melting and spilling as liquid in zero-gravity, which would be problematic.

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