Indian-origin NASA astronaut Anil Menon harvests vegetables in space:Calls it the ‘Best meal cooked so far,’ here’s how cooking happens on the ISS

Imagine growing your own salad greens, not in a backyard garden, but while floating hundreds of kilometres above the planet. That’s exactly what NASA astronaut Anil Menon just did, and the internet can’t stop talking about it.
In a video shared from the station, the astronauts are seen harvesting ‘kale and wasabi mustard greens’ that had been growing inside NASA’s Veggie plant-growth system. The vegetables were grown for about a month as part of NASA’s research into producing fresh food in space. Who is Anil Menon, and why is he on the ISS? Anil Menon is an Indian-origin NASA astronaut and a trained emergency physician who has spent years working in high-stakes environments, from earthquake relief efforts to spaceflight medicine. He was picked as part of NASA’s 2021 astronaut class and previously served as SpaceX’s first flight surgeon. He launched to the International Space Station aboard a Roscosmos Soyuz spacecraft in mid-2026, alongside two Russian cosmonauts, for a mission expected to last roughly eight months. Besides conducting spacewalks and station maintenance, Menon has taken a keen interest in one of NASA’s more unusual research projects, growing food in orbit.
The veggie experiment The greens Menon harvested weren’t just a fun side project. They’re part of a long-running NASA study using a device called the Veggie plant-growth chamber, a compact space ‘garden’ that lets scientists observe how crops behave in the absence of gravity.
Working alongside fellow astronaut Jessica Meir, Menon tended to a batch of kale and wasabi mustard greens for about a month before finally picking the leaves for a taste test. This isn’t NASA’s first attempt at orbital farming; earlier crews have grown lettuce, mizuna mustard, and other leafy greens on the station.
But each round adds new data on how plants adapt to microgravity, and how astronauts might one day grow their own food during missions to the Moon or Mars, rather than relying entirely on supplies shipped from Earth. How the harvesting and cooking actually happened Once the greens had matured, Menon and Meir carefully picked several leaves from the growth chamber. In space, even simple kitchen tasks require extra planning; there’s no running water or open flame, so meals are typically prepared using rehydration or warming pouches, or eaten fresh straight after harvest.
The duo turned their fresh kale and mustard greens into what Menon called their tastiest creation yet, documenting the whole process on video for the folks back home. Also read: Pakistan names its first lunar rover ‘Jinnah-1’: How it will explore the Moon’s south pole years after India’s Chandrayaan-3

Why this tiny harvest is a big deal It might look like a small, feel-good moment, but growing food in space carries real scientific weight. As missions to the Moon and Mars stretch on for months or years, astronauts will need more than pre-packaged meals, they’ll need fresh nutrients, variety, and honestly, a mental boost from tending something alive in an otherwise metallic, sealed environment. Fresh produce grown on board could eventually cut down how much food needs to be launched from Earth, making deep-space travel more sustainable in the long run. Menon also credited NASA’s Veggie team for guiding the crew through the growing process, underlining that this kind of research isn’t just about a nice space salad; it’s laying the groundwork for how humans might one day feed themselves permanently beyond Earth.