the FAT wall

At last, the long awaited Space Barley—the beer made with barley grown in space—is here to take you where everyone has been before: Drunk. Fortunately, nobody can hear you shouting in space, which is good for my hangovers.

What's so special about the Space Barley?

The "space barley" used to make this beer is the fourth generation descendant of the Haruna Nijo malting barley that was developed by Sapporo Breweries and kept in space for five months during 2006 as part of our collaborative research with the Russian Academy of Sciences and Okayama University with the purpose of achieving self-sufficiency in food in the space environment. Since Sapporo Breweries was founded, we have continued to create excellent varieties for raw materials, and we are the only company in the world that operates breeding/research organizations for both barley and hops. This, the world's first sale of this "space beer," is the result of our extended nurturing/development of the required technologies.

Sounds good to me, Sr. Sapporo. The only bad thing is that there are only 250 boxes available, each with six 330ml bottles. I'd gladly pay the $113 to get one of these, but you have to first get into a lottery at the Space Barley page. Which is like hoping to win a ticket to get into the space shuttle's last flight. [Sapporo Beer via Pink Tentacle]

Send an email to Jesus Diaz, the author of this post, at wrfhf@tvmzbqb.pbzjesus@gizmodo.com.

Imagine perusing the soda aisle and feeling like you just magically entered a black and white television—no purple Welch’s cans or red Coca-Cola bottles filling the shelves. If Mother Nature has a say, she’d probably like to see a colorless soda can selection because of the reduction air and water pollution that would happen as a result of eliminating the coloring process. The colorless design would also reduce the energy required to separate the toxic paint from the aluminum during the recycling process.

So, if colored labeling is removed, how will you tell a Coke from a Dr. Pepper? Designer Harc Lee came up with the idea for a super slick convex logo that eliminates the need for toxic paints and sort of looks like the soda of the future, at least in “Back to the Future.”

Or, if pop companies don’t have the equipment for the convex design, a plain can labeled with a Sharpie will work just fine.

Tree hugging, earth friendly green news.

We love a bit of creamy foam topping our morning coffee, but haven't really wanted to invest the funds or the counterspace in an actual milk steamer. Here's how we get around it with just a jar and a microwave!

1. Find a jar with a lid and fill it with as much milk as you normally like in your coffee (or other hot beverage!). The milk should fill the jar no more than half way to allow room for the foam.
2. Shake the jar with the lid on as hard as you can until the milk has become frothy and doubled in size. This takes us about 30 seconds.
3. Take the lid off and microwave for another 30 seconds. The foam will rise to the top of the milk and the heat from the microwave will help stabilize it.
4. Pour the milk into your coffee using a spoon to hold back the foam. Then scoop the foam on top!
We first heard about this technique in Harold McGee's book On Food and Cooking, but didn't believe it would work until we tried it. Now we're hooked and make a little warm milk and foam every morning while our coffee is brewing. We usually use 2% milk, but cream and half-and-half make even better foam!