Khymos » TGIF http://blog.khymos.org - dedicated to molecular gastronomy Tue, 31 Jan 2012 07:41:27 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 TGIF: Food related “Periodic videos” http://blog.khymos.org/2010/08/20/tgif-food-related-periodic-videos/ http://blog.khymos.org/2010/08/20/tgif-food-related-periodic-videos/#comments Fri, 20 Aug 2010 05:15:16 +0000 Martin Lersch http://blog.khymos.org/?p=2471 I believe most chemists are familiar with the “periodic videos” from the University of Nottingham, covering all the known chemical elements. The series features professor Martyn Poliakoff who’s grey hair is really worthy of a professor! They have now covered the complete periodic table of elements, and have even started to update some of their previously posted videos. There are also thematic videos as well as videos covering specific molecules appearing now. As a chemist I think the videos are great fun to watch since they show a number of exotic experiments I’ve never seen before combined with plenty of nice-to-know facts. I certainly recommend all these videos (for an overview, check out their website), but the reason I chose to blog about this is that I was delighted to find a number of more or less food related videos! These are definitely not going to make you a better cook. But some of them are quite amusing to watch, and you may even learn some chemistry as you go. But most of the food related videos are really just for fun :)

Cheeseburger in hydrochloric acid


Do ice cubes made with heavy water float or sink?

Exotic ways to cut through butter

Spectacular ways of destroying pumpkins for Halloween

Tea chemistry

See Martyn Poliakoff boil an egg

(Martyn mentions that the yellow color of egg yolks is due to a sulfur containing compound, but I’m not really convinced he’s right about that. The yellow color is mainly due to a group of chemical compounds called xanthophylls which have long conjugated double bond systems that absorb light. And BTW – if you want to dissolve the egg shell in your own kitchen: skip the hydrochloric acid and use vinegar instead.)

Baking a cake in the lab with akward equipment…

… and then figuring out what to do with the cake
(it wasn’t eaten since it was made in a chemical lab)

Mirror images: Carraway and spearmint

Fun chemistry with Crispy creme eggs

Chocolate and roses for Valentines day

As the name suggests, the TGIF posts are a little less serious than what I otherwise post here at Khymos. I hope you enjoy it :)

]]> http://blog.khymos.org/2010/08/20/tgif-food-related-periodic-videos/feed/ 1 TGIF: Periodic tables of food http://blog.khymos.org/2009/10/30/tgif-periodic-tables-of-food/ http://blog.khymos.org/2009/10/30/tgif-periodic-tables-of-food/#comments Thu, 29 Oct 2009 23:05:44 +0000 Martin Lersch http://blog.khymos.org/?p=1566 pt-blank
Does food fit into this table?

Here at Khymos I aim to cover things related to food and chemistry, and as I stumbled over a periodic table of cupcakes (with clickable “elements” linked to recipes) I couldn’t resist to dig a little deeper. And look what I found! The periodic table of elements is iconic, but the periodic table has also become an organizing metaphor for all sorts of things, including food. The Internet database of periodic tables holds more periodic tables than you could ever dream of, but it’s not complete – at least not with regards to food. Here are the food related periodic tables that I’ve been able to find. Fun? Yes! Useful? No, not really :) At the end of the post I’ve also included examples of how the real periodic table of elements can be illustrated in a more or less edible fashion. All images are linked to the page where I found them. Are you aware of other periodic tables of food? Please let me know and I’ll include them in this post.

pt-beer
Available as a poster. HighRes available here.

pt-booze
Available as a poster

pt-candy

pt-cereal
In case you wondered, it’s a periodic table of breakfast cereals!

pt-cheese
HighRes flash version

pt-condiments
Condiments that periodically go bad

pt-cupcakes
Cupcakes – what else! And each “element” is linked to a recipe. Very well made!

pt-dessert

pt-food-disneyland
Period table of food from Disneyland in Los Angeles (Photo: Martin Lersch). Click for a larger image.

pt-herbs-spices
Available as a poster

pt-fruitsnuts
Available as a poster

pt-mixology
Available as a poster

pt-sandwichry
Available as a poster

pt-scoville
HighRes version available

pt-produce
Two cropped scans available from Slashfood. Original was published in “Simple Life” fall 2006.

pt-vegetables
Available as a poster

pt-wine1
Available as a poster

pt-menu
The menu at “Miracle of Science Bar & Grill” in Boston is a periodic table painted on the wall. More info at the C&EN blog. Photo: Scott Beale/Laughing Squid


Periodic table of preserves. Full resolution view available through this preview (browse to page 22 of the preview, book pages 48-49).

The real periodic table of elements represented in food
If you think fitting some kind of food into a periodic table is stretching a little too far, why not make an edible version of the real periodic table? In the process you may even learn the name of some elements :)

pt-real-cupcakes
Photo by melpenguin

pt-pumpkins
A nice idea for Halloween?

As the name suggests, the TGIF posts are a little less serious than what I otherwise post here at Khymos. I hope you enjoy it :)

]]> http://blog.khymos.org/2009/10/30/tgif-periodic-tables-of-food/feed/ 8 TGIF: Presenting the tongue jacket – the molecular gastronomy of tomorrow http://blog.khymos.org/2007/07/27/tgif-presenting-the-tongue-jacket-the-molecular-gastronomy-of-tomorrow/ http://blog.khymos.org/2007/07/27/tgif-presenting-the-tongue-jacket-the-molecular-gastronomy-of-tomorrow/#comments Fri, 27 Jul 2007 20:40:22 +0000 Martin Lersch http://blog.khymos.org/2007/07/27/tgif-presenting-the-tongue-jacket-the-molecular-gastronomy-of-tomorrow/ tongue-jacket.png

Next month’s TGRWT challenge will be to combine flavours #156 and #298!

;)

[Invention and artwork by Jordan Brough, winner of an Eureka contest over at Gizmodo]

]]> http://blog.khymos.org/2007/07/27/tgif-presenting-the-tongue-jacket-the-molecular-gastronomy-of-tomorrow/feed/ 2 TGIF: Hot coffee with industrial laser http://blog.khymos.org/2007/05/11/tgif-hot-coffee-with-industrial-laser/ http://blog.khymos.org/2007/05/11/tgif-hot-coffee-with-industrial-laser/#comments Fri, 11 May 2007 22:09:56 +0000 Martin Lersch http://blog.khymos.org/2007/05/11/tgif-hot-coffee-with-industrial-laser/

Such an advanced setup, and then he uses instant coffee???!!!!

Found via everydayscientist a while ago…

]]> http://blog.khymos.org/2007/05/11/tgif-hot-coffee-with-industrial-laser/feed/ 5 TGIF: Fed up with foam? http://blog.khymos.org/2007/03/29/tgif-fed-up-with-foam/ http://blog.khymos.org/2007/03/29/tgif-fed-up-with-foam/#comments Thu, 29 Mar 2007 21:52:48 +0000 Martin Lersch http://blog.khymos.org/2007/03/29/tgif-fed-up-with-foam/ When many people hear molecular gastronomy, they think of culinary foams, originally introduced by Ferran Adria at El Bulli. In case you’re fed up with the foams, here’s a T-shirt to express your feelings:

foam-tshirt.jpg

Personally, I can’t even say I’ve taste any of these foams yet… Guess I’ll wait a little with the T-shirt then ;)

[Thanks to Chef John over at foodwishes]

]]> http://blog.khymos.org/2007/03/29/tgif-fed-up-with-foam/feed/ 1 TGIF: Molecular chocolate http://blog.khymos.org/2007/03/01/tgif-molecular-chocolate/ http://blog.khymos.org/2007/03/01/tgif-molecular-chocolate/#comments Thu, 01 Mar 2007 21:37:11 +0000 Martin Lersch http://blog.khymos.org/2007/03/01/tgif-molecular-chocolate/ chocolate-theobromine.jpg

When eating this chocolate, you eat a molecular model of what you are eating (well, at least one of it’s components) – theobromine!

It’s the brainchild of two Belgians, chocolatier Pierre Marcolini and furniture designer Dirk Meylaerts. More info on the Belgian and US website.

The taste scheme used for the different elements does not seem to be quite consistent (i.e. each element represented by a unique color):

  • Carbon: matte brown (crunchy shell)
  • Nitrogen: golden (mixture of caramel, roasted pineapple and praline) + bronze (bitter ganache with gingerbread notes)
  • Hydrogen: white (milk chocolate ganache flavoured with raz-el-hanout, sheathed in white chocolate) + bronze (bitter ganache with gingerbread notes)
  • Oxygen: shiny dark brown (blend of chocolate and caramel ganache with a touch of tonka bean)

    • chocolate-theobromine-assigned.jpg

    [Via Inkling Magazine]

    ]]>     http://blog.khymos.org/2007/03/01/tgif-molecular-chocolate/feed/ 6     TGIF: Levitating strawberry http://blog.khymos.org/2007/02/08/tgif-levitating-strawberry/ http://blog.khymos.org/2007/02/08/tgif-levitating-strawberry/#comments Thu, 08 Feb 2007 20:54:46 +0000 Martin Lersch http://blog.khymos.org/2007/02/08/tgif-levitating-strawberry/

    The video is from the High Field Magnetic Laboratory in Nijmegen. Read more about levitation and check out their other movies (includes a levitating tomatoe!).

    A short explanation of how this works:

    An object does not need to be superconducting to levitate. Normal things, even humans, can do it as well, if placed in a strong magnetic field. Although the majority of ordinary materials, such as wood or plastic, seem to be non-magnetic, they, too, expel a very small portion (0.00001) of an applied magnetic field, i.e. exhibit very weak diamagnetism. The molecular magnetism is very weak (millions times weaker than ferromagnetism) and usually remains unnoticed in everyday life, thereby producing the wrong impression that materials around us are mainly nonmagnetic. But they are all magnetic. It is just that magnetic fields required to levitate all these “nonmagnetic” materials have to be approximately 100 times larger than for the case of, say, superconductors. This experiment was conducted at the Nijmegen High Field Magnet Laboratory.

    (Via food for design)

    ]]>     http://blog.khymos.org/2007/02/08/tgif-levitating-strawberry/feed/ 0     TGIF: Achewood on molecular gastronomy http://blog.khymos.org/2007/01/26/tgif-achewood-on-molecular-gastronomy/ http://blog.khymos.org/2007/01/26/tgif-achewood-on-molecular-gastronomy/#comments Fri, 26 Jan 2007 15:58:12 +0000 Martin Lersch http://blog.khymos.org/2007/01/26/tgif-achewood-on-molecular-gastronomy/
    achewood.jpg

    Click to see the complete comic.

    ]]>     http://blog.khymos.org/2007/01/26/tgif-achewood-on-molecular-gastronomy/feed/ 0     TGIF: Mechanical gastronomy! http://blog.khymos.org/2007/01/05/tgif-mechanical-gastronomy/ http://blog.khymos.org/2007/01/05/tgif-mechanical-gastronomy/#comments Fri, 05 Jan 2007 19:01:29 +0000 Martin Lersch http://blog.khymos.org/2007/01/05/tgif-mechanical-gastronomy/ This is slightly off-topic, but take a look at these two videos on mechanical gastronomy. First one is a lego-machine that opens a bottle of beer. The second one is a Rube Goldberg (homepage, Wikipedia) machine that pours a beer (jump to 2:10 if you want to skip the intro and just watch the action). Rube Goldberg described his cartoons as “symbols of man’s capacity for exerting maximum effort to accomplish minimal results”, but has since given name to complicated machines that perform simple tasks!

    ]]>     http://blog.khymos.org/2007/01/05/tgif-mechanical-gastronomy/feed/ 0     TGIF: Molecular gastronomy with a twist http://blog.khymos.org/2006/11/17/tgif-molecular-gastronomy-with-a-twist/ http://blog.khymos.org/2006/11/17/tgif-molecular-gastronomy-with-a-twist/#comments Fri, 17 Nov 2006 19:37:35 +0000 Martin Lersch http://blog.khymos.org/2006/11/17/tgif-molecular-gastronomy-with-a-twist/ Heston Blumenthal was recently featured in “Private Eye”, a british satire magazine (found via Aidan Brooks). They included the following recipe for boiled eggs:

    heston blumensilly

    A further discussion of boiled eggs from the perspective of molecular gastronomy is found here.

    ]]>     http://blog.khymos.org/2006/11/17/tgif-molecular-gastronomy-with-a-twist/feed/ 1