Kitchen Chemistry with Cabbage Juice Indicators
Peeps in a vacuum chamber
Chief Scientist, Carl Nelson puts Peeps in a vacuum chamber to find out what happens when the air is removed from the fluffy candy.
Squishy Circuits with Play-Doh
Making circuits with Play-doh is pretty cool. If you have some doh at home you can use that for conductive circuits. To take it to the next level you will need some insulating doh as well. Below are recipes for both at home conductive and insulating “Play-doh”.
Making Conductive Play-doh
The Ingredients
- 1 cup Water
- 1 1/2 cups Flour
- 1/4 cup Salt
- 3 Tbsp. Cream of Tartar (or 9Tbsp of lemon juice)
- 1 Tbsp. Vegetable Oil
- Food Coloring (optional)
Cooking Procedure
- Mix water, 1cup of flour, salt, cream of tartar, vegetable oil, and food coloring in a medium sized pot.
- Cook over medium heat and stir continuously.
- The mixture will begin to boil and start to get chunky.
- Keep stirring the mixture until it forms a ball in the center of the pot.
- Once a ball forms, place the ball on a lightly floured surface.
- The ball will be very hot. We suggest flattening it out and letting it cool for a couple minutes before handling.
- Slowly knead the remaining flour into the ball until you’ve reached a desired consistency.
- Store in an airtight container or plastic bag. While in the bag, water from the dough will create condensation. This is normal. Just knead the dough after removing it from the bag, and it will be as good as new. If stored properly, the dough should keep for several weeks.
Making Insulating Play-doh
The Ingredients
- 1 1/2 cup Flour
- 1/2 cup Sugar
- 3 Tbsp. Vegetable Oil
- 1/2 cup Deionized (or Distilled) Water
(You really want to use Distilled water to keep the amount of conductive ions to a minimum. Otherwise, the doh will be conductive rather than insulating.)
Cooking Procedure
- Mix solid ingredients and oil in a pot or large bowl, setting aside ½ cup flour to be used later.
- Mix with this mixture a small amount of deionized water (about 1 Tbsp.) and stir.
- Repeat this step until a majority water is absorbed by the mixture.
- Once your mixture is at this consistency, knead the mixture into one “lump”.
- Knead more water into the dough until it has a sticky, dough-like texture.
- Now, knead in flour to the dough, until a desired texture is reached.
- Store in an airtight container or plastic bag. While in the bag, water from the dough will create condensation. This is normal. Just knead the dough after removing it from the bag, and it will be as good as new. If stored properly, the dough should keep for several weeks.
The idea of creating electrical circuits using Play-doh and the recipes above come from The University of St. Thomas. Check out their Squishy Circuits page for more details.
Non-toxic lava lamp fun
Edible Instant Worms
Using sodium alginate, a seaweed extract, you can make fun and edible “worms” just like some fancy restaurants.
How to make edible blood
Halloween is just around the corner and making a batch of edible blood is a great way to spend the day in your kitchen with the kids. If you’re gearing up for Halloween and are in need of some fake blood, there is no reason to go out and pay a lot of money for this kinda thing. You most likely have everything you need at home to whip up a batch of blood.
The mentos fountain experiment
It’s become a classic summertime messy experiment. Drop some mentos (or lifesavers, or sweet tarts, or salt, or …) into a bottle of carbonated soda and you can release volumes of gas and soda from the container.
Fun with Oobleck
A mixture of cornstarch and water displays some interesting properties. Sometimes it’s a liquid, sometimes it’s a solid and it all depends on how you handle it.
Classic candle in a glass experiment
This demonstration has been done for over 2,000 years! Non-the-less there are still incorrect explanations of the science being published and distributed today. Read more
Amazing Milk Experiment
Combine whole milk, some food coloring and dish detergent to create some cool color mixing patterns. Read more
The egg in a jar experiment
How can you get an egg inside a jar that has an opening smaller than the diameter of the egg? Find out in this weeks Imagine It! video.
Extract DNA with stuff you have at home
Using simple items you have in your bathroom and kitchen, you can extract DNA from fruits like bananas, kiwi or strawberries. Read more
Naked eggs for everyone!
Nothing is more fun that making a Naked Egg. Find out how to make one, or two or three! Read more
Using flames to measure calories
What better way to determine the caloric content of food than to burn it with liquid oxygen? There are more exacting ways of course, but the flames (and smells) created this way are pretty impressive. Check it out!
Does it float or does it sink?
Before watching the video answer this question, “does a soda can placed in water float or sink?” A clue might be that this is all about density, or the mass per volume of a substance.
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Antacids – how do they work?
Have you ever eaten to much and had to reach for an antacid? Check this out to see how an antacid makes you feel better.
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Acid/Base chemistry with a head of cabbage
With a head of red cabbage you can have lots of fun doing some kitchen chemistry. Red cabbage has a natural acid/base indicator that you can extract and test all sort of things to see if they are an acid or base.
Read more
Liquid Nitrogen Ice Cream
Using liquid nitrogen, which boils at -320 degrees, we make a batch of tasty ice cream in less than 2 minutes.
Read more
How to make edible blood
Halloween is just around the corner and making a batch of edible blood is a great way to spend the day in your kitchen with the kids. If you’re gearing up for Halloween and are in need of some fake blood, there is no reason to go out and pay a lot of money for this kinda thing. You most likely have everything you need at home to whip up a batch of blood. Read more
Edible instant worms
Using the seaweed extract, sodium alginate, and a solution of salty water you can create something that looks like worms in seconds.
Normally alginate is used as a food thickener for things like jellies, jams and pie fillings. That doesn’t mean you can’t play with it to make noodle-like “worms” and tiny spheres that look like caviar in just seconds.
We will be featuring this activity in the Science Studio during the month of October as part of our Spooky Science event. So stop by and ask a Team member for a demonstration.
Is it safe to eat that moldy bread?
Let me set this up for you … it’s Labor day weekend and you’ve fired up the grill with some burgers, brats, or whatever grilled goodness you can think of. You head inside and grab the bag-o-buns and (gulp) notice a few small greenish spots on the surface.
While no one is looking you face the critical decision, do you pluck off the little green spots and serve the buns up, or is it time to head to the store for a fresh set? It’s a hard call, but keep this in mind – the colorful spots you see on food are just the surface spores that allow the mold to reproduce. Just like plants, mold has roots below the surface that can travel deep into the food.
Because the colorful spores on the surface of your food are just part of the mold, scraping or cutting this part off of your bread or bagel won’t save you from eating a mouthful of fungus. While you probably won’t die from eating fungus, keep in mind that foods that are moldy may also have invisible bacteria growing along with the mold.
The colorful mold you see on the surface of food is just the tip of what is going on inside.
Most molds are harmless, but some are dangerous. Some contain mycotoxins. These are poisonous substances produced by certain molds found primarily in grain and nut crops, but are also known to be on celery, grape juice, apples, and other produce. These substances are often contained in and around the threads that burrow into the food and can cause allergic reactions or respiratory problems.
Are any food molds beneficial?
Yes, molds are used to make certain kinds of cheeses and can be on the surface of cheese or be developed internally. Blue veined cheese such as Roquefort, blue, Gorgonzola, and Stilton are created by the introduction of P. roqueforti or Penicillium roqueforti spores. Cheeses such as Brie and Camembert have white surface molds. Other cheeses have both an internal and a surface mold. The molds used to manufacture these cheeses are safe to eat.
What to do if you see mold on your food?
The USDA has a nice chart about how to deal with various foods that are moldy. Check it out for all the details. It breaks down into the two obvious options – Don’t Eat vs. Eat.
Don’t Eat – throw these out if you see mold
- Luncheon meats, bacon, or hot dogs, Cooked leftover meat and poultry, Cooked casseroles, Cooked grain and pasta, Soft cheese
- (such as cottage, cream cheese, Neufchatel, chevre, Bel Paese, etc.) Crumbled, shredded, and sliced cheeses (all types), Yogurt and sour cream, Peanut butter, legumes and nuts, Bread and baked goods.
- Jams and jellies (The mold could be producing a mycotoxin. Microbiologists recommend against scooping out the mold and using the remaining condiment.)
- Cheese made with mold (such as Roquefort, blue, Gorgonzola, Stilton, Brie, Camembert)
Eat – after cutting off the mold
- Hard salami and dry-cured country hams (Eat them. Scrub mold off surface. It is normal for these shelf-stable products to have surface mold.)
- Firm fruits and vegetables (such as cabbage, bell peppers, carrots, etc.) as well as hard cheeses are OK to eat if you remove the mold. Cut off at least 1 inch around and below the mold spot. Keep the knife out of the mold itself so it will not cross-contaminate other parts of the produce.
Remember while you’re preparing all this food, removing mold, etc. that you should be washing your hands and food prep surfaces often. Check out what can be growing in and around the surfaces of your house in this Imagine It! video segment. In short, avoid the molds and wash your hands – often!
Hot enough to fry an egg on the sidewalk?
It’s hot outside. Really hot. But is it hot enough to fry an egg on the sidewalk? It’s only a matter of time before you will see someone on TV trying to make this happen. Most likely they will not be successful.
The problem is that an egg needs a temperature of 158°F to become firm. In order to cook, proteins in the egg must denature (modify), then coagulate, and that won’t happen until the temperature rises enough to start and maintain the process. Read more
Fun with Mentos and diet cola
A roll of mentos candies and some cola are all you need for some messy fun when it’s hot outside. It’s become a classic experiment to suddenly release all the carbon dioxide gas from a two liter bottle by dropping the candy inside. In fact, you can release the gas from a bottle of soda with lifesavers, sweet tarts and rock salt just to name a few.
How to make a Naked Egg
A “naked egg” is an egg that has no shell. Let me say that again, an egg with no shell. This is not something you normally run across and even when I show a naked egg to someone they often just don’t get the idea that the shell is gone – yet the egg stays intact. You might want to check out the anatomy of an egg to get an idea what we are dealing with. Read more
Exploding Eggs for the holiday
For the holiday we are exploding eggs filled with hydrogen gas. Check it out. Read more
Balancing an egg – can you make it happen?
Can you balance an egg only on the vernal equinox? Of course not! you can balance an egg on its end any day of the year. Check out what else you can do with a few eggs at home. Read more
Soda and Diet Soda Experiment
Materials:
- 1 can of Soda
- 1 can of Diet Soda
- 1 or 2 Large clear containers (like an aquarium, or large bowls)
- Water
What to do:
- Add water to the aquarium so that it can cover the soda cans.
- Place the cans into the water.
What the Science:
The diet soda and regular soda differ in the amount of solids (sugar/sugar substitute, soft drink ingredients, etc.) that are dissolved in the liquid. The amount of dissolved solids in a liquid will affect the liquids density. An object will become buoyant (float) when it is less dense than the liquid surrounding it. Buoyancy is simply an upward acting force caused by the fluid. Archimedes was the first person to dissect this phenomenon and stated what is now known as Archimedes’ Principle “Any object, wholly or partially immersed in a fluid, is buoyed up by a force equal to the weight of the fluid displaced by the object.”
Note that one packet of an artificial sweetener is approximately equal in sweetness to about three packets of sugar and the artificial sweetener weighs less. The regular soda has more solids (soft drink ingredients and sugar) dissolved in the liquid than the diet soda so it is denser than the water surrounding it in the aquarium causing it to sink, and the diet soda has less solids dissolved (soft drink ingredients and artificial sweetener) so it is less dense and floats.
How to Make a Shrunken Head
Making a shrunken head for Halloween is fun and it only takes a few items to get started. To create a shrunken head you need just a few items. Gather up an apple, granny smith, red delicious, whatever, pretty much any apple will work. The basic steps for making a shrunken head from an apple are: remove the skin, coat with lemon juice, carve features, soak in saltwater, let shrink for 2 weeks, decorate with optional features. See it’s so easy anyone can do it. Plus if you really mess up you can always eat the apple! Read more