Chinese astronauts on the Tiangong Space Station cooked chicken wings and steaks in orbit for the first time using a new hot‑air oven. The flame‑free, smokeless unit reaches about 375°F and can prepare wings in roughly 28 minutes, while meeting strict safety and filtration requirements. The appliance expands a menu of nearly 200 items and complements onboard vegetable growing during the six‑month Shenzhou‑21 mission, advancing crew comfort and long‑duration life‑support capabilities.
First 'Barbecue' in Orbit: Tiangong Crew Cooks Chicken Wings and Steaks with New Hot‑Air Oven
Chinese astronauts on the Tiangong Space Station cooked chicken wings and steaks in orbit for the first time using a new hot‑air oven. The flame‑free, smokeless unit reaches about 375°F and can prepare wings in roughly 28 minutes, while meeting strict safety and filtration requirements. The appliance expands a menu of nearly 200 items and complements onboard vegetable growing during the six‑month Shenzhou‑21 mission, advancing crew comfort and long‑duration life‑support capabilities.
02:36 AM, 11/12/2025Science
Imagine the smell of barbecue—while orbiting Earth
Chinese astronauts aboard the Tiangong Space Station have, for the first time, cooked chicken wings and steaks in orbit using a newly delivered hot‑air oven. The milestone blends practical engineering with a small but meaningful boost to crew morale: familiar, freshly cooked food in microgravity.
How the oven works in microgravity
Open flames are strictly prohibited on spacecraft, so the oven is a smokeless, oil‑free appliance that deliberately circulates hot air to compensate for the fact that heat doesn’t rise in microgravity. It incorporates precise temperature control, residue collection and filtration systems to meet the station’s strict safety and air‑quality standards, and it’s designed to operate within the space station’s power limits.
Performance and comparison
Officials say the unit reaches roughly 375°F, allowing it to cook significantly faster than earlier prototypes. Chinese authorities report chicken wings can be ready in about 28 minutes, a dramatic improvement over NASA’s 2020 prototype cookie oven, which required more than two hours to bake a single item.
Why this matters
Space food has come a long way since the Gemini and Apollo eras, when crews relied on freeze‑dried cubes and rehydrated pouches and even avoided bread because crumbs can damage equipment or harm crewmembers. Tiangong’s galley now offers nearly 200 menu items, including nuts, cakes and fresh produce. The new oven complements life‑support and habitability advances: crew members are growing lettuce, cherry tomatoes and sweet potatoes in an onboard vegetable garden and can now turn some of those harvests into cooked meals.
“The aroma of chicken wings in orbit is a small but tangible step toward making long‑duration life in space feel more like home.”
The oven’s arrival came with the Shenzhou‑21 mission, which delivered a crew for a six‑month stay to test technologies, run experiments and extend China’s sustained human presence in low Earth orbit. Beyond comfort, developments like this support long‑term crew health, morale and the logistics of extended missions.
For now, a floating chicken wing is a first for humanity—and a reminder that even in orbit, people still crave the flavors of home.