Final Art Project
Watercolor painting has been around since prehistoric times and was mainly used for manuscript illustration since the ancient Egyptian times, illustrations that usually accompany text to give it more flare, such as borders or small drawings. It did not become a proper art medium as we know it today until the renaissance era. It was mainly used for manuscript since ancient egypt and up till the european renaissance. It was popularized by German Painter Albrecht Dürer who used it to paint several photographs of landscape, wildlife, etc. And since then, watercolor has evolved from a simple tool to give text extra flare to a massive medium of painting.
Watercolor paint is made of several different materials, a colored pigment which provides the main color, a brightener which brightens the color, a binder (usually gum arabic) that makes it sit at the top of the paper for a while rather than having it absorbed immediately, a plasticiser (usually glycerin) that makes the finished product more stable and prevent it from cracking, a humectant (usually corn syrup or honey) which helps the paint become wet again after drying, an extender (usually dextrin) which gives it a smoother consistency, a dispersant which repels the paint, and of course, water.
Watercolor paintings are best done on Hydrophilic (this means that the object rather mixes with, dissolves in, or is able to get wet from water) paper due to it absorbing water the most. If you use Hydrophobic (meaning it repels and does not mix with water) paper then it has a harder time absorbing the paint, thus making it easy to spread around to places you don’t want it to go.
Watercolor paint, being primarily water, is a lot more transparent than normal paint. So it appears brighter, more vibrant, and illuminescent. This is because of the water it uses, water is a very prominent part of watercolor paint so of course it has a major role to play on the texture of the watercolor paint.
I originally was going to do a simple watercolor painting of a Japanese cherry blossom. But after several nudges from my teacher to add onto it, it got a little unhinged, adding a pentagram in the sun, a tombstone, a severed head, and test saying "Death Takes All" in large red letters. It is not supposed to mean anything, it just went a little crazy as I went on painting it.
Watercolor paint is made of several different materials, a colored pigment which provides the main color, a brightener which brightens the color, a binder (usually gum arabic) that makes it sit at the top of the paper for a while rather than having it absorbed immediately, a plasticiser (usually glycerin) that makes the finished product more stable and prevent it from cracking, a humectant (usually corn syrup or honey) which helps the paint become wet again after drying, an extender (usually dextrin) which gives it a smoother consistency, a dispersant which repels the paint, and of course, water.
Watercolor paintings are best done on Hydrophilic (this means that the object rather mixes with, dissolves in, or is able to get wet from water) paper due to it absorbing water the most. If you use Hydrophobic (meaning it repels and does not mix with water) paper then it has a harder time absorbing the paint, thus making it easy to spread around to places you don’t want it to go.
Watercolor paint, being primarily water, is a lot more transparent than normal paint. So it appears brighter, more vibrant, and illuminescent. This is because of the water it uses, water is a very prominent part of watercolor paint so of course it has a major role to play on the texture of the watercolor paint.
I originally was going to do a simple watercolor painting of a Japanese cherry blossom. But after several nudges from my teacher to add onto it, it got a little unhinged, adding a pentagram in the sun, a tombstone, a severed head, and test saying "Death Takes All" in large red letters. It is not supposed to mean anything, it just went a little crazy as I went on painting it.
Chemistry of Food and Cooking "Very Simple Nachos"
Recipe card
Reflection
How successful was your experiment in helping you understand your food and/or improve its characteristics? What would be next steps if you were to continue research on this topic? In support of your answer you might choose to discuss any of the following or other questions of your own design:
This experiment helped me take my new understanding of state changes and heat and think about them while I put them to use. For the first time, I was thinking about making my food in a different way, a way that makes me smarter. That way I'm thinking about what the cheese particles are doing while in the microwave while melting and covering the chips. Although I feel like I could have been more in depth and measured the temperature of each nacho after I put them in the microwave. This is because I feel like it would help me a lot if I knew which cheese conducted the most heat after a minute in a microwave. But overall, I am glad I am thinking about my food in a completely new way.
How did your cooking process transform your food macroscopically and affect the food’s overall characteristics? Be specific and describe the transformations that happened on the molecular level that led to the observed macroscopic changes.
The nachos changed their shape and texture quite drastically. All the particles in the cheese moved faster and faster causing the cheese to expand. The cheese expanding caused it to become a much gooier substance. Then the cheese as it got gooier and gooier then got mixed up with the cheese particles from other pieces of cheese, causing the cheese to merge together. As all the cheese pieces got gooier and gooier the moisture content got moved over to the chips causing the chips to become softer. And the cheese started to cover the surface of the chips in melted cheese.
In what way(s) are cooking and doing science similar and in what way(s) are they different? How are a cook and a scientist investigating food similar or different?
Cooking is in many ways very similar to science. You could even say cooking IS science. This is because science explains a lot about how cooking works, and cooking is just it being put into practice. For example the project I just did explains heat and particles moving, causing the substance to expand more and more until it becomes a liquid, that is exactly what happened to the cheese on my nachos. Of course there are many many more examples of why cooking is science, such as heat transfer, chemical reactions, ETC. So I think it is pretty safe to say that science explains why cooking even exists in the first place.
- What might be altered in your experiment to increase your confidence in your results?
This experiment helped me take my new understanding of state changes and heat and think about them while I put them to use. For the first time, I was thinking about making my food in a different way, a way that makes me smarter. That way I'm thinking about what the cheese particles are doing while in the microwave while melting and covering the chips. Although I feel like I could have been more in depth and measured the temperature of each nacho after I put them in the microwave. This is because I feel like it would help me a lot if I knew which cheese conducted the most heat after a minute in a microwave. But overall, I am glad I am thinking about my food in a completely new way.
How did your cooking process transform your food macroscopically and affect the food’s overall characteristics? Be specific and describe the transformations that happened on the molecular level that led to the observed macroscopic changes.
The nachos changed their shape and texture quite drastically. All the particles in the cheese moved faster and faster causing the cheese to expand. The cheese expanding caused it to become a much gooier substance. Then the cheese as it got gooier and gooier then got mixed up with the cheese particles from other pieces of cheese, causing the cheese to merge together. As all the cheese pieces got gooier and gooier the moisture content got moved over to the chips causing the chips to become softer. And the cheese started to cover the surface of the chips in melted cheese.
In what way(s) are cooking and doing science similar and in what way(s) are they different? How are a cook and a scientist investigating food similar or different?
Cooking is in many ways very similar to science. You could even say cooking IS science. This is because science explains a lot about how cooking works, and cooking is just it being put into practice. For example the project I just did explains heat and particles moving, causing the substance to expand more and more until it becomes a liquid, that is exactly what happened to the cheese on my nachos. Of course there are many many more examples of why cooking is science, such as heat transfer, chemical reactions, ETC. So I think it is pretty safe to say that science explains why cooking even exists in the first place.