An October candy that either tastes like fall or earwax, depending on who you ask. Ok, but what's in it?Pretty much just sugar. According to their website, Brach's classic candy corn contains “Sugar, Corn Syrup, Confectioner's Glaze, Salt, Dextrose, Gelatin, Sesame Oil, Artificial Flavor, Honey, Yellow 6, Yellow 5, Red 3.” What are confectioner's Glaze and dextRose?Weird stuff. Confectioner's glaze is 35% shellac. Shellac is a sticky substance, or resin, excreted by female lac insects after they have eaten a lot of tree bark. The resin is then harvested, heated, filtered. and mixed with an alcohol solution to create a food glaze, so that’s fun. As for dextrose, it’s just a simple sugar that is chemically identical to glucose. wait. so, if sugar, dextrose, honey, and corn syrup are all types of sugar, how much sugar is in these candies?Short answer: a lot. According to the Brach's nutrition label, there are about 28 grams of sugar in 19 pieces, or a serving. In case you were wondering exactly how much that is, one can of regular Red Bull has 27 grams of sugar, according to their website. You read that right; an entire can of Red Bull has less sugar than 19 pieces of Brach's candy corn. And if you were wondering how much sugar your body needs, the American Heart Association recommends women have no more than 25 grams and men have no more than 36 grams of sugar daily. A serving of candy corn is more than my recommended daily sugar intake. So, yeah, candy corn is basically straight sugar. So they aren't made of corn?What do you think corn syrup is? It’s literally a syrup made from corn. Is that why It's called candy corn?No. Candy corn was created to look like individual corn kernels. In fact, it’s original name was “Chicken Feed.” You see, although the candy was originally invented in the 1880s, trick-or-treating wasn’t really big until after World War II, when the sugar rations were lifted. At that point, most of America was agrarian, so, to please the people, they made candy pumpkins, turnips, chestnuts, and clover leaves in addition to the candy corn. While the pumpkins still remain, we have gotten rid of the others, which is probably for the best. so, what is candy corn?A highly controversial fall candy containing Asian Beetle resin and excessive amounts of sugar that became a fall staple by catering to the populous farmers of America, gradually working its way into being a Halloween tradition. curious? Here's some more reading!
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A caterpillar turns into a butterfly. Yeah, but how?Well, are you asking about a chrysalis or a cocoon? is thEre a Difference?Of course there is! The three words used to describe where metamorphosis takes place are pupa, chrysalis, and cocoon. A pupa is used to refer to the naked stage of either butterflies or moths. A chrysalis is the same thing, but only for butterflies. A cocoon, however, is the silk a moth larvae spins around itself before it becomes a pupa. Ok, then let's just talk about pupas. How do LARVAE know when to start Making them?As those of you who have ever read The Very Hungry Caterpillar know, larvae essentially eat until they can’t anymore, at which point they are full grown, molting many times in the process. but how can you tell? Is it just random?Very few things in nature are random, dear reader. There are some things to look for in a larvae to figure out if it’s about to make its pupa. One is that it stops eating, you know, since it pretty much has been eating constantly. Related to that, it might start regurgitating undigested food (hey, you asked). Some larvae will move off the plant to find a safer place to build a pupa since, it obviously won’t be eating from that plant anytime soon. Changes in coloring can also signify the larvae is ready to pupate. wait, how does it build a pupa?Well, first it wanders around aimlessly for a day to find the perfect spot. After this, the process varies form species to species. Some attach their tails to the plant using silk, while others attach both their tails and their waist. Larvae without this ability often pupate on the ground. Some hang off high branches, while others go close to the ground. Regardless, they curl themselves up and spend around two days preparing for its last molting. However, instead of shedding skin and walking out, it sheds its skin to reveal a soft, seemingly lifeless pupa. what about the ones that cocoon?For cocooning larvae, it is essentially the same, but the molting takes place within the silk cocoon. (Side note: cocoons are actually really cool. My personal favorite is the urodid.) so, what happens inside the Pupa? Do they turn to mush?No. Larvae do not turn to mush inside the pupa; this is merely a common misconception (thanks, Tumblr) disproved by a 2013 study of larvae using CT imaging. While some parts of the larvae disintegrate, the lungs, guts, brain, and other organs essentially remain the same. Additionally, many butterfly/moth parts already exist inside the larvae, called imaginal discs, and undergo rapid development rather than dissolving, such as legs, antennae, eyes, parts of the mouth, genetalia, and the wings. do you mean to tell me that caterpillars have wings?Not necessarily. The imaginal discs that eventually become wings are, for the most part, just “blobs of tissue” that later develop into things such as wings. how does the rest of the body develop?Well, here’s the thing. When you already have all of your internal organs, there’s not much left to do. The outer cells of the larvae-soon-to-be-winged-creature reform to make a body, and the wing scales grow and change color. Other than that, it’s pretty much just a lot of growth. However, it is a lot of growth, which is why metamorphosis takes an average of two weeks (24 days). So, what happens inside a chRysalis?A caterpillar dissolves minus its internal organs and imaginal discs, which undergo rapid growth while the body is reformed around them, eventually creating a butterfly. CURIOUS? HerE's some more reading!
What kind of a question is that? The kind i want answered?Slow down, Captain Salty. To answer your question, a sandwich is “an item of food consisting of two pieces of bread with meat, cheese, or other filling between them, eaten as a light meal” according to the New Oxford American Dictionary. So, a burrito isn't a sandwich?Um, last I checked, burritos aren’t made with two pieces of bread. But neither are hoagies or subs.You do have a point. And what about Hot dogs? Where do they fall?Alright, alright! I get it; the dictionary definition is extremely ambiguous. Like, other fillings? You could put a piece of butter between two pieces of bread and it would count (although, why would you?). so, wHere can we find the answer?For more definitive answers, let’s turn to the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA)'s Food Standards and Labeling Policy Book, a 187 page document I have the pleasure of scrolling through to answer your questions about sandwiches. Not what I originally planned to do with my weekend, but any excuse not to my homework works for me. Well, what does it say a sandwich is?In order to be a sandwich, it has to “contain at least 35 percent cooked meat and no more than 50 percent bread” (p 154). Wait, so what's a pB&J? Apparently not a sandwich. They aren’t even discussed in the document. Really?Yes. Really. i don't like this.Neither do I, reader. Neither do I. What are BurrItos?“A Mexican style sandwich-like product consisting of a flour tortilla, various fillings, and at least 15 percent meat or 10 percent cooked poultry meat. The flour tortilla is rolled and may or may not have tucked ends. Fillings may contain, in addition to meat or poultry meat, such major ingredients as beans, potatoes, cheese, rice, tomatoes, and chilies” (p 22). But i thought sandwiches had to have 35 percent cooked meat.Ah, but it’s not a sandwich; it is merely “sandwich-like”. Do i even want to ask what a hot dog is?No, but I’m gonna tell you anyway. Hot dogs are listed as frankfurters in the category “Sandwiches (Meat or Poultry as Components of ‘Dinner Products’)”. In other words, according to the USDA, hot dogs, along with hamburgers and “sliced poultry meat with a bun”, are “a sandwich type product” (p 154). so, let me get this straight: a Hot dog and a burrito are both more of a sandwich than a Pb&j?According to the official USDA standards, yes. But why?That's the real question. As for why a PB&J isn’t included in the document, the USDA primarily regulates the labeling of meat, poultry, and egg products, since their mission is “[to help] rural America to thrive”. Last I checked, rural America wasn’t all peanut farms. However, to give you piece of mind, I did some more research and found a United States Food & Drug Administration (FDA) document entitled “A Guide to Federal Food Labeling Requiremets for Meat, Poultry, and Egg Products”. Sounds really enticing, right? I’ll spare you the 177 pages of federal food regulations and let you know that, on page 9, the 14th page of the document, it talks about a “grilled cheese sandwich”. So, one might figure that if two pieces of bread with a slice of cheese slapped in between is a sandwich, that a PB&J more than qualifies. That makes me feel a little better, but i'm still stUck on this whole “burrito sandwich” thing.Then it’s time to delve into more government documents, which, by the way, are drier than a winter in the Arctic Basin. In one of the most famous rulings of burritos and sandwiches, the New York State Department of Taxation and Finance considered the Mexican cuisine to be a sandwich in the 2011 Tax Bulletin. According to the bulletin, “sandwiches include cold and hot sandwiches of every kind that are prepared and ready to be eaten…A sandwich can be as simple as a buttered bagel or roll, or as elaborate as a six-foot, toasted submarine sandwich.” Remember the pieces of bread with a slice of butter in between I mentioned earlier? Yeah, that’s a sandwich in the great state of New York. Why ARE GOVERNMENTS LIKE THIS?Well, the first thing to recognize is that these documents are for regulatory purposes. The job of the the New York State Department of Taxation and Finanace isn’t to figure out what a sandwich is, but to define a sandwich for sales tax purposes. Similarly, the job of the USDA is to define what nutritionally qualifies as a sandwich. The true definition of a sandwich is clearly pretty subjective, and we may not have a definite answer, but what I think we can agree on is there's some sort of bread on both sides and something more substantial than just butter in between. So, WHAT IS A SANDWICH?A sandwich is a popular type of food that has bread with something filling in between it that governments have attempted to define as a means to regulate food inspections and sales taxes, when in actuality there is no clear definition. As such, I leave the debate to the comments. This post was suggested by a large and surprisingly aggressive side conversation during my Contemporary Thought/Political Issues class. Curious? Here's some more reAdiNg!
Well, they have brains that control all of their bodily functions, just like us humans. I mEan, how do they camOuflage themselves?Actually, the purpose of changing skin color isn’t to camouflage; the skin cells respond to the chameleon's emotions. (Basically, their entire skin is a mood ring.) The skin also changes color in order to regulate the chameleon's body temperature and attract potential mates. Fine, then how do they change their skin color?They have a special layer of skin cells, called nanocrystals, that are adjusted to reflect different frequencies of sunlight. how does that work?Well, I’m glad you asked. So, chameleons have two layers of skin. The top layer contains two layers of nanocrystals, “iridescent cells that have pigment and reflect light”. When a chameleon is relaxed these nanocrystals reflect shorter wavelengths of light, like blue and green. However, when the chameleon is excited, the nanocrystals spread out, reflecting long wavelengths, such as red and orange. Then why aren't Chameleons blue all the time?Well, underneath all of these nanocrystals is a layer of yellow pigment, which mixes with the blue reflected light to create a green. This yellow pigment lies below the nanocrystals, as yellow as a color is particularly susceptible to UV rays. Also, only males are equipped with these nanocrystals. While females and juveniles have some color-changing capabilities, they pretty much remain brown, which is also a sort of camouflage when you think about it. SO IT THAT HOW OCTOPUSES And such work, too?Not really. Octopuses are among a number of cephalopods that can change their color instantly, including squids and cuttlefish. They use chromatophores, which are cells that contain what is essentially microscopic sacks of paint. Additionally, while chameleons' color changes are activated by heart rate and motion, octopuses' are controlled by “a complex array of nerves and muscles”. This allows octopuses to regulate their appearances more easily. As a result, not only can octopuses change their skin into different colors and patterns, but they can also change its texture, which a chameleon definitely can’t do. SHOULDN'T IT BE “octopi”?Nope. Only words with Latin roots end with an “i”. Therefore, since the word “octopus” has a Greek root, the correct term is “octopuses”. People just changed it to sound fancy (also, it’s fun to say), and now it’s considered correct by spell-check, when it’s technically not a real word. WHATEVER. Can we get back to chameLeons?Please. how do they do that eye thing?Now this is a different story. Their eyes rest not the sides of their head in cones, not sockets, allowing for free movement. To keep the eyes from falling out, chameleons have developed a muscular eyelid that protects it from dangers, as it is so exposed, and makes sure the eye itself doesn’t roll away. This gives the chameleon the ability to have practically a 360 degree view of its surroundings. What about when the eyes move in DIFFERENT directions?Two separate groups of nerves work the eyes, allowing them to move independently. This ability gives the chameleon a panoramic view while searching for prey. Once the prey is located, the chameleon will once again use its eyes together. It also gives chameleons crazy good reflexes, as they can see everything all the time. so, how do CHAMELEONS work?Chameleons change color involuntarily by raising their heart rate and feeling emotions, which changes the spacing of the nanocrystals in their skin (totally different from octopuses), and move their eyes in strange ways through the use of cone-like eye sockets and separate nerve bundles for each eye. curious? Here's some more reading!
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