"Yo! Art Burn here. Today we're gonna bake us some ice cream. I know what you're thinking. Art's spent too much time next to the microwave. But you can do it. And here's what yiz gonna need. Be jottin' it down!"

• 3 egg whites
• 1/2 cup of sugar
• 1 cup of really hard, frozen ice cream
• 1 big, thick, hard cookie
• Baking sheet
• Aluminum foil
• Hand mixer
• A grown up!!

1. Have your grown up heat your oven to 500 degrees Fahrenheit.
2. Cover the baking sheet with aluminum foil.
3. Put the egg whites into a bowl and use the mixer to beat them for about five minutes until they're stiff.
4. Keep beating the egg whites while adding the sugar a little at a time until they're fluffy and shiny. ("The name for this stuff is meringue!")
5. Put your cookie on the baking sheet.
6. Put your scoop of ice cream on top of the cookie. Make sure it doesn't hang over the edge of the cookie.
7. Completely cover the cookie and the ice cream with the meringue.
8. Put it in the oven for three to five minutes until the meringue is a delicate, light brown.
9. Take it out of the oven, put it on a plate, and eat up!

"The ice cream is still frozen even after being in that hot oven. Why's that, Art?"

"Here's why. You know how a Styrofoam cup lets you hold hot cocoa without burning your hand? That's because Styrofoam is full of tiny, little pockets of air that act as insulation. Insulation is stuff that keeps hot stuff hot and cold stuff cold. When we beat the egg whites, we put lots of tiny, little air pockets in the meringue so it acted like the Styrofoam and kept the ice cream nice and cold, even in the hot oven. So there you have it, another work of Art! Until next time, this is Art Burn saying, Hey, get outta my web site!"

Tiny pockets of air are a very common kind of insulator, not only in Styrofoam and in the polyurethane foam inside the walls of refrigerators, but also in sleeping bags, clothing, and home insulation. The woven fibers of woolen jackets and sweaters and the filling of sleeping bags and ski jackets all insulate with the air of little air pockets.

Nature has used this idea for millions of years. The fur of mammals and the feathers of birds are terrific insulators because they can trap air in small spaces.

How do tiny air pockets reduce the transfer of heat? Heat can be transferred or moved by conduction (passes from molecule to molecule), by radiation (by invisible rays) and by convection (currents). The stuff surrounding the air pockets blocks the radiation; the air does not conduct heat well because its molecules are far apart; and the fact that the air pockets are small prevents air currents. Since the heat can't be transferred, it stays where it is, keeping things nice and toasty.

Return to Beakmaniac's World

This page hosted by

Get your own free page.