Nosh Noms

Nosh Noms are a plant-derived food ingredient that is inedible while raw but can be processed into a variety of cooked dishes or crushed into Brackene. The ingredient is obtained by harvesting mature Nosh Sprout plants; each mature plant yields 12 Nosh Noms. Nosh Noms appear naturally in Rust Biomes as buried objects and can also be obtained by uprooting domesticated plants. If an asteroid lacks a Rust Biome there is no way to obtain Nosh Noms from the environment.

Nosh Sprout is the cultivatable form of the plant. A domesticated Nosh Sprout planted in a Planter Box, Farm Tile, or Hydroponic Farm requires 5 kg/cycle of Dirt and 20 kg/cycle of Ethanol irrigation. A domestic plant reaches maturity in 21 cycles and produces 12 Nosh Noms. Wild Nosh Sprouts grow four times slower, reaching maturity in 84 cycles and still producing 12 Nosh Noms.

The plant has specific environmental requirements: it grows between −25 °C and 0 °C, requires an air pressure between 25 g and 10 kg, and must be grown in a carbon dioxide atmosphere. Nosh Sprouts are more water-efficient than Sleet Wheat for producing calories: when grown and processed into Tofu they yield a higher calories-per-kilogram-of-water ratio (about 41 cal/kg based on plant irrigation alone, or roughly 26.1 cal/kg when including the water used to make tofu).

Practical yields and food planning: one mature Nosh Sprout produces 12 Nosh Noms every 21 cycles. If each duplicant requires 1,000 kcal per day (every 21 cycles), converting beans into prepared foods yields the following guidance:

• Processed into Tofu: each plant effectively supports net 7,200 kcal every 21 cycles; you need about 2.92 plants per duplicant if exclusively feeding Tofu and not reserving beans for replanting.
• Spicy Tofu: net 8,000 kcal per plant-cycle set; about 2.625 plants per duplicant.
• Curried Beans: net 15,000 kcal per plant-cycle set; about 1.4 plants per duplicant. Wild plants require roughly 4× the number of plants to meet the same caloric output due to slower growth.

Storage and preservation: planted Nosh Noms do not spoil while left in the ground. This allows indefinite preservation by leaving harvested beans planted and disabling the growing plot to avoid additional irrigation/fertilizer costs, but only if other conditions (temperature, pressure, atmosphere) are maintained.

Additional interactions and notes:

• Nosh Noms can be cooked into multiple recipes; each raw Nosh Nom provides 600 kcal as a baseline ingredient when used to make simple dishes.
• Since February 2024 quality-of-life changes, Pacu critters can consume Nosh Noms at a rate of 1 unit per cycle, making Nosh Noms a viable critter feed in appropriate farms.
• Cultivation locations: Planter Boxes, Farm Tiles, and Hydroponic Farms are all valid for planting Nosh Sprout.
• Obtaining seeds: harvest and uproot mature plants or dig up Buried Objects in Rust Biomes to recover Nosh Noms.
• Water and resource planning should account for the ethanol irrigation requirement and cold growth temperature; placing Nosh Sprouts on an Arbor Tree can change water routing and efficiency considerations.

Use Nosh Noms when you need a cold-climate, water-efficient plant source that scales well when converted into higher-calorie dishes; plan for ethanol irrigation and CO2 atmosphere management to maximize yields.