What is chewing gum made of and what happens if you swallow it? These days, chewing gum is just a gum base with sweeteners and a plasticizer. You can swallow it without any harmful effects. Humans have used something to chew on for thousands of years. A 5,000-year-old lunch of birch bark tar with toothmarks […]
#384 What is chewing gum made of and what happens if you swallow it? Read More »
How much maple tree sap do you need to make 1 liter of maple syrup? It takes about 40 liters of sap to make 1 liter of maple syrup. Maple syrup is made by taking the sap from sugar maple, black maple, or red maple trees. The trees are tapped when they are about 30
#368 How much maple tree sap do you need to make 1 liter of maple syrup? Read More »
Why can we eat lettuce and spinach, but we can’t eat leaves and grass? We can’t eat leaves and grass because of the cellulose and silica they contain. There are several different ways of getting energy. Plants photosynthesize and make energy, which they store in their cells. Herbivores eat the plants to get the energy
#362 Why can we eat lettuce and spinach, but we can’t eat leaves and grass? Read More »
When did supermarkets start? The first supermarket was opened in 1916. Most of us don’t think twice about pushing a cart around a supermarket and then heading to the cash register to pay. However, that is a concept that is only slightly over 100 years old. A few changes in society had to happen before
#353 When did supermarkets start? Read More »
Why does popcorn pop? Pressure builds up as the water in the kernel heats up until it explodes. People have been eating popcorn for thousands of years. Archaeological evidence of popcorn from Peru in 4700 BC has been found. Corn, which is more commonly known as maize, was domesticated about 10,000 years ago but modern
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How does a pressure cooker work? By using high pressure to raise the boiling point of the water. Pressure cookers were invented in 1679 by a French physicist. He was trying to find a way to cook food faster. Cast iron pressure cookers were made in Germany in 1864. Pressure cookers improved through the early
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How does a refrigerator cool food? By transferring the heat from inside the refrigerator to outside using evaporation. Fresh foods have to be kept cool to make them last longer. As soon as they are opened, or cut, bacteria start to decompose them. When foods decompose, they taste bad, but some bacteria can produce toxins
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Why does metal spark in a microwave oven? The microwave charges one side of the metal positively and one side negatively. This charge can ionize the air, making sparks. First, we need to look at what microwaves are. A microwave is a type of electromagnetic radiation. Electromagnetic radiation is energy that moves in waves and
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It is olive oil that is made cold-pressed, without heat or chemicals. Olive oil has been used for thousands of years. Olives grow naturally around the Mediterranean and they were picked and eaten by Neolithic people about 6,000 years ago. Olives appeared in Asia Minor, which is where Turkey is today. The olive tree was
#312 What is virgin olive oil? Read More »
Is irradiated food safe? Irradiating food kills off all of the bacteria, gives the food a fresher taste than other preservation methods, and doesn’t make the food radioactive. Ionizing radiation was discovered in 1895. Wilhelm Röntgen discovered that rays coming off a vacuum tube could penetrate a screen and react with a barium solution. He
#291 Is irradiated food safe? Read More »
