FOOD SCIENCE

1. Undressing an egg

Necessary material
Raw egg
Tube glass or similar
Vinegar
The experiment
1. Put the egg in the glass and add vinegar until it covers.
2. Bubbles will begin to form on the surface of the egg. Leave the egg in vinegar for 24 hours
3. On the second day renew the vinegar, that is, remove the vinegar in the glass and add new vinegar
4. After seven days, remove the vinegar and carefully wash the egg with water
5. You already have a "naked" egg
Once the experiment is finished, you can try observing the egg on a light source.
What happened?
The eggshell is mainly composed of calcium carbonate (around 94%), while vinegar is basically diluted acetic
acid (specifically it is composed of about 5% acetic acid and 95% water). What happens when we dip an egg
in vinegar is that a chemical reaction is triggered between the acetic acid in vinegar (CH3CO2H) and the
calcium carbonate in the eggshell (CaCO3).
In short, acetic acid reacts with calcium carbonate to result in carbon dioxide (which are the bubbles that
are observed when introducing the egg into the vinegar), calcium acetate (which is the foreign-looking
matter that remains floating in the vinegar) and water.
Finally, you should know that some of the vinegar can enter through the membrane of the egg, causing it to
enlarge slightly.
2. How to tell if an egg is hard or raw
Did you mix hard-boiled eggs with raw eggs in the refrigerator
1 Place the egg on a smooth, flat surface.
2 Rotate the egg. Hold the egg between your fingers and the thumb of your hand. With a sharp rotating
motion, rotate the egg sideways like a spinning top. The movement should be like when you snap your
fingers. The egg must rotate at a regular and constant rate.
3 Stop the rotation quickly. Extend your index finger as if you were pointing. Quickly place your finger in the
centre of the egg while it is turning. As soon as it stops turning, immediately remove the finger from the egg.
Press hard enough to stop the movement of the egg quickly. It should go from turning to stopping in a second
or less.
4 See what happens to the egg. Depending on whether the egg is hard boiled or raw, it will behave differently
at this point. Look at this: If the egg stays still, it’s hard. If the egg keeps spinning slowly or wobbles, it’s raw.
This happens because the egg white and yolk are liquid and they still spin inside the shell. The egg’s centre
of gravity shifts when the liquid content moves, keeping the egg moving.
5 For a faster test, watch the egg move as it spins. The above test will allow you to determine exactly whether
the egg is hard boiled or not. However, you can also tell by looking closely at the way the egg rotates; you
don’t have to stop it with your finger. This is convenient if you need to check many eggs at once. If the egg
rotates rapidly and steadily like a spinning top, it is hard. Its centre of gravity is stable. If it spins slowly,
staggers more or is difficult to turn, it is raw. The fluid inside moves as the egg rotates and causes it to lose
balance.
6 Demonstration with salt and water with flour in a bowl.

3. How to fry an egg in cold.

If you have always believed that to fry an egg you need heat, you are wrong.

Necessary material
1 egg
1 deep dish or fountain
Alcohol pharmacy.
The experiment
1. Carefully pour the alcohol into the dish, to about half its capacity.
2. Crack the egg carefully on a deep dish, ensuring that the yolk does not break.
3. Wait between 10 minutes and one hour4. Breakfast iron
What happened?
The alcohol reacts with albumin, a protein that contains the egg and ensures that the white is transparent
to white. The chemical reaction, called denaturation, is similar to that caused by applying heat, but
remember that this egg is not edible!
4. Iron breakfast
True?

Necessary material
Cereals with added iron
A powerful magnet
A bag with hermetic closure (zip type or similar)
Water
The experiment
1. Get some breakfast cereals with added iron (the higher their content, the better the experiment will be
appreciated).
2. Put the cereals in a bag with an airtight closure and add water (you can get an idea of the quantities by
watching the video).
3. Close the bag and let it sit for at least an hour.
4. After that time, approach your magnet and you will see how iron is attracted to it.
What happened?
In this case I don't think much explanation is needed, right? When mixing breakfast cereals with water, the
added iron they contain passes into the liquid and is thus attracted to the magnet.

5. Invisible refreshment

Necessary material
Cola soda
Milk
The experiment
1. Open a bottle of cola and add 2% milk.
2. Watch what's happening
Changes occur slowly, but are easily appreciated. You can take a look every half hour, or every hour.
What happened?
As we have already explained repeatedly, the most important proteins in milk are caseins, which are
forming a colloidal dispersion, which in other words means that they are in balance within the fluid. This
balance is due to the fact that, with the pH of the milk (around 6.6) the electrical charges that predominate
in these molecules are negative, so that the net charge is negative. That causes there to be a repulsion
between the proteins and so they remain in balance.
A cola contains different acids (mainly carbonic acid and, above all, phosphoric acid), so its pH is quite low
(around 3). When we add milk to the soda, the protein load changes, so that as the pH decreases, the
number of positive loads increases. There comes a time (pH=4.7) when the net charge is zero, that is to say
the negative charges and the positive charges are equalized (this is called the isoelectric point), so that the
proteins bind to each other and the equilibrium that had until now is broken. These joints form large
aggregates of high weight that cannot be kept in suspension, so precipitate dragging other substances,
such as those that bring colour to the soda.

6. The chemistry of red cabbage

Material required
Lombarda. If you can’t get it easily, you can try cherries, red grapes, blackberries or blueberries.
Water
Blender
Strainer
Three glasses
White paper
Apron (stains are difficult to remove)
Test substances: baking soda, lemon juice, vinegar, and anything else you can think of.
The experiment
1. Crush 6 red cabbage leaves together with 12 glasses of water (the ratio should be about 1 red cabbage
leaf per two cups of water)
2. Pass the crushed leaves together with the water through a sieve
3. Fill three glasses to half with the juice obtained
4. Add vinegar in one of the glasses and you will see how the colour goes from purple to red. It is because it
is an acid
5. Add baking soda in another glass and you will see how the color goes from purple to green. It is because
it is a base.
6. Use the third glass to experiment with other substances and find out if they are acidic or basic. You can go
further and use red cabbage juice to make your own pH indicator paper. Just dip some filter paper into the
juice and let it dry. Then cut the paper into thin strips and that’s it. You can dip it in different liquids to know
its pH: the redder it gets, the more acidic the substance will be, and the greener, the more basic it will be.
What happened?
Red cabbage, and other vegetables such as red grapes or blueberries, contain pigments called anthocyanins
that give them red, purple or blue colour. These pigments, which are soluble in water, change colour when
the pH varies, so that they turn red in acidic environments, with a pH lower than 7, and bluish green in
alkaline (basic) environments, with a pH greater than 7.

7. Strawberry DNA

Necessary material
Strawberries
Isopropyl alcohol (5ml)
Dishwasher soap (10 ml) Salt
Airtight closing bag (zip type)
Water (90ml)
Measuring utensils
Strainer
Glasses
Tweezers
Spoon
Experiment
1. Put the isopropyl alcohol in the freezer (we will need it later)
2. Pour 90 ml of water into a glass
3. Add 10 ml of dishwasher soap
4. Add 1/4 teaspoon of salt
5. Mix everything. This is going to be our DNA extraction solution.
6. Insert a milling cutter into a sealed bag
7. Pour the solution we have just prepared inside the bag, together with the strawberry
8. Expel all the air you can from the bag and close it
9. Crush and knead the bag until the strawberry is reduced to porridge
10. Pour the mixture into a glass through a strainer
11. Use a spoon to press the strawberry pieces against the strainer
12. Transfer about 50-100 ml of the juice to a small glass
13. Add 5 ml of isopropyl alcohol and keep the mixture at eye level to observe the changes
14. Do you see a separation? Do you see a half-floating «white thing»? That’s the strawberry DNA. Use
tweezers to get it out of the glass.

What happened?
So much fears have put us in the body with transgenic foods that 65% of Spaniards think that the tomatoes
they eat do not have genes The truth is that absolutely all living beings have genes, and strawberries would
not be less. Why do I talk about genes? Wasn’t it about DNA? Well, actually, a gene is a segment of DNA
(here you can know the differences), but what we were going for. Strawberries are ideal for this experiment
for two reasons: from them you get more DNA than with any other fruit and they are also octoploids, that
is, they have eight identical sets of chromosomes (human cells are diploid, meaning they have two sets of
chromosomes, with the exception of gametes). These circumstances make the strawberry DNA easy to
extract and see. To extract DNA, each component of the extraction solution plays a role. Soap helps dissolve
cell membranes. Salt is added to break down the protein chains that bind nucleic acids, releasing DNA chains.
Finally, DNA is not soluble in isopropyl alcohol, especially when the alcohol is very cold.