Chemihacks

Three chemistry lifehacks for your kitchen

Safe­ty pre­cau­tions

Warn­ing! Only un­der adult su­per­vi­sion

Equip­ment

  • stove;
  • saucepan;
  • beef;
  • wa­ter;
  • ice;
  • met­al spoon;
  • bot­tle with glued la­bel;
  • warm bak­ing soda so­lu­tion;
  • dish sponge;
  • sil­i­cone sealant;
  • white vine­gar;
  • glass sur­face.

Step-by-step in­struc­tions

Place some beef in a saucepan with wa­ter and let it sim­mer on the stove. Af­ter a while, foam forms on the sur­face – this is a mix­ture of wa­ter, air, beef fat, and pro­tein. The foam is eas­i­ly re­moved by touch­ing it with an icy spoon. Do this sev­er­al times to make the broth fat-free!

Im­merse a bot­tle with a glued la­bel in a warm so­lu­tion of bak­ing soda and leave for 5 min­utes. Then take the bot­tle out and wash it with wa­ter – the la­bel comes off eas­i­ly! The re­main­ing glue is easy to re­move with a wet sponge.

Spilled some sil­i­cone sealant? Coat it with white vine­gar. Af­ter 10 min­utes, you’ll have no prob­lem clean­ing it up. You can use a dish sponge to speed up the process.

Process de­scrip­tion

The beef fat in the foam so­lid­i­fies at about 40°C (104°F). There­fore, it hard­ens eas­i­ly and re­mains on the icy spoon!

When bak­ing soda is dis­solved in wa­ter, the so­lu­tion medi­um be­comes al­ka­line. This weak­ens the glue’s ad­he­sive abil­i­ties, and the la­bel is easy to peel off!

White vine­gar is a so­lu­tion of ap­prox­i­mate­ly 5% acetic acid. Un­der its in­flu­ence, the long sil­i­cone mol­e­cules break down into small­er ones. Vine­gar can help you re­move even the most stub­born sil­i­cone sealant!

En­joy ex­plor­ing the world with a MEL Chem­istry sub­scrip­tion!

Try it