Hilton promotes ‘baking in space’ with former NASA astronaut

Hilton is promoting baking in space with former NASA astronaut Mike Massimino, a veteran of two space flights, to help improve the quality of food in space.

Just about a month ago, DoubleTree by Hilton has announced that its trademark welcome cookie is soaring to new heights as it becomes the first food to be baked in space. Continuing its hospitality beyond Earth, the hotel chain has now joined forces with NASA veteran, Mike Massimino, the first person to tweet from space and one of only two astronauts to actually gain weight in space.

The new initiative by Hilton aims to improve the quality of life in space while paying tribute, as humankind celebrates this year the 50th anniversary of the lunar landing. “It’s not just getting a cookie into space but it’s also inspiring people to learn about what’s going on in space,” Massimino said.

Hilton’s mission is to launch a batch of its ‘DoubleTree Cookie’ dough, along with a prototype oven, on a rocket bound for the International Space Station (ISS). The hotel chain has collaborated with Zero G Kitchen and NanoRacks to help build the technology. Hilton’s microgravity experiment is scheduled to begin later this year.

“We’ve never done this before”

Massimino further commented: “If we’re going to go further away on long-duration missions in the future, we’re going to have to figure out ways to cook our own food and grow our own food. We’ve never done this before, so we don’t know exactly what’s going to happen. It’s going to be a lot of learning.”