Cheese, Glorious Cheese!

Cheese – We put it in or on all kinds of things. We have it in our mac & cheese. We put it on hamburgers and call them cheeseburgers.  We melt it and pour it over chips and call them nachos. It goes with ham, turkey, and beef. At the ball park it pairs with chili on top of French fries.  It’s in lasagna, pizza, fondue, and au gratin potatoes. (You might call them cheesy potatoes for short.) It goes with crackers, with wine, and of course, covering broccoli! It’s even good all by itself.

It is estimated that there are almost 2000 kinds of cheeses around the world. A Google search told me that on average, every American eats about 42lbs of cheese each year. That’s a lot of cheese! Cheese can be white, yellow, orange, or even white with blues swirls. It can be hard and brittle like parmesan,  solid but sliceable like cheddar, smooth and silky like American cheese (the kind that are slices covered in plastic wrap) or even soft and squishy like the French cheese like brie.

Have you ever wondered how cheese is made? All cheese start with one thing. Some kind of milk. Many come from cows, but they can also be made from goats, buffalo, and other animals. Each animal milk gives the cheese a special flavor.

1. The process starts with adding a “starter culture” (a type of good bacteria) to acidify and flavor the milk.

2. Next an enzyme called rennet is added to the milk to help it clump together. This separates it into two parts: curds (the protein solids) and whey (the leftover liquid).

3. The curds are cut drained and pressed to remove even more whey. The whey is often used to make protein powder.

4. The curds are shaped in molds and sent away to age. This adds flavor and texture.

5. If the cheese is eaten right away it is called squeaker cheese because it makes a squeaking sound when you bite it. Otherwise it might age for 30, 60, 0r even 90 days.

There are many popular cheeses in America. Cheddar is one of my favorites on hamburgers. Swiss cheese has a nutty taste and lots of funny holes. I also really like pepper jack, and Colby cheese. There are even stinky cheeses like limburger, but Papaw doesn’t really like those.

What is your favorite cheese? If you ever get to visit a cheese shop, be sure to try as many as you can. Well I hope you liked finding out about cheese. Here are a couple videos if you want to watch people making cheese.

 Love Papaw.

   

 

National Ice Cream Month

 

Guess what? July is National Ice Cream Month. It was established by President Ronald Reagan in 1984, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. The third Sunday of July, which falls on July 20th this year, is also National Ice Cream Day. Ice cream goes back a long way, back to the ancient Persians and Chinese. Its current form is credited to the French and Italians during the Renaissance. That was even before your parents were born (the 1300s-1500s).

Ice cream comes in lots of flavors. Some are classic, like vanilla and chocolate. Others are trendy like moose tracks and peanut butter overload.  If you go to Baskin Robbins they say they have 31 different flavors. You could even go to a place like Cold Stone where they will mix whatever flavors you want. You can get nuts, sprinkles, cookies pieces, or even gummies in your ice cream.

When Papaw was young my favorite place to go on a warm summer night was Dairy Queen. We would usually get an ice cream cone that was dipped in chocolate that made a hard shell on the outside. There was creamy ice cream inside and crunchy chocolate outside. Yum! Once in a while we even made banana splits. Have you ever had a banana split? They’re great!

When Mema and Papaw can find them, we now like to get waffle cones. It is a crispy waffle cone with whatever ice cream inside that you want. And don’t forget the whipped cream! We can’t go to Disneyland without getting at least one! So what kind of ice cream do you like? If you clean your rooms, do your chores, and don’t talk back to your mother, they might just take you out for some ice cream. (Tell them Papaw recommends it as a great family fun night. Just don’t send him the bill!)

I hope you liked our talk about ice cream. I did! Now let’s go look in the freezer…

Love Papaw.

It’s Summer!

 

Summer is finally here, and it’s a time for families to do things together. Some go fishing or camping. Others like to go on a hike in the woods or even explore museums or zoos in your city. You could go to a water park or make one in your own back yard. There are a lot of choices that you and your family can talk about. What every you do as a family, make sure you participate so that you can enjoy everything. Here are some summer fun hints that can help you to have a great time and less stress.

• Be patient – sometimes it takes a little while to get where you are going. Asking, “Are we there yet?” every 10 minutes will not help it go faster.

• Share – make sure everyone gets a turn at the fun.

• Be present – Put your phone, Switch, Kindle, or whatever devices you have and enjoy being with each other. They can be great while you’re travelling in the car, but when you get to your destination, tune in!

• Be Creative – help turn your back yard into a water park (be sure to get your parent’s permission!)
• Focus on the fun and not stuff – It’s fun to buy things on a vacation, but don’t go overboard. Sometimes a simple ice cream cone with the family is better than expensive toys that break all too soon.

• Be sure to say thank you – that your parent, the park ranger, the person in the store, even the people cleaning up. They all helped you have a good time.

Well, that’s all for now. Have a great summer!

Love Papaw.

Jumping What?

 

Here in the central Valley of California, we have many strange and unusual things. Every year at about this time, for only a few weeks, we see a fascinating event that I want to share with you, jumping galls. Galls are strange formations that form on the leaves of trees when an insect damages the leaf tissue. Think of it as a “forest pearl”. Pearls form when something like a grain of sand or other debris irritates an oyster and it forms a hard shell around the object. In the same way, when the insect lays an egg in the leaf, the tree starts to grow a protective area around it. They can come in many shapes, sizes, and colors. Some can be as big as a baseball; others look like tiny little seeds. Here is a picture of the many kinds we can see.

My favorite one is very small. The gall is about the size of the letter “o”. The wasp is about ½ the size of a mosquito. It contains the wasp larva of the jumping oak gall wasp. They look like a little white worm. When it’s ready, it starts to wiggle, and the gall falls to the ground. Then the larva starts to make it bounce! It can jump over a centimeter high, and twice as long. Sometimes, if there are enough of them, it can sound almost like it is raining! Scientists believe that they are trying to get under the leaf litter to get out of the summer heat and so that birds or ants don’t eat them. As fall begins, they form a pupa and rest through the winter. They stay there until early spring, and then they break out and fly away. Here are a couple videos of them jumping. 

     

If you would like to read more about galls, here some cool websites.

https://www.redding.com/story/life/2022/08/05/what-causes-jumping-oak-galls-valley-oaks/10174690002/

Jumping Galls in Chico, CA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mr43HNXNsbI

That’s all for now!

Love, Papaw.

The Octopus

Octopuses (sometimes called octopi) are members of a group of animals called mollusks. Mollusks have soft bodies and a mantle (a type of covering somewhat like a robe). They may have one or two shells, or none at all. The group includes clams, slugs, snails, squid, octopus, and cuttlefish among others.

Their name comes from two words, octo meaning eight, and pous meaning foot. Octopuses do not have shells. They have eight legs, each with several row of suckers.  They have a huge brain for their size and very large, well developed eyes. You can find them in every ocean. They can range in size from 1 inch to over 9 feet long!

Octopus love to eat fish, crabs, and other ocean creatures. They catch them in their arms and pull them toward their mouth which is located at the center of their many arms. They have a beak that looks a lot like a bird’s beak that can rip their prey into bite-sized pieces.

They move by squirting water through a tube called a siphon. If they get scared, they can also shoot a cloud of ink from a special ink sac. This confuses an attacker and also hides them as they make a quick get-away.  If they choose to, they can actually make their skin look the same color as the rocks and plants around them. They can even make their skin look bumpy so they can blend in even better!

Octopuses are very intelligent. They have been known to actually unscrew jars to get to tasty treats left inside. They are amazing escape artists and can survive for short periods out of water as long as they stay wet. One aquarium keeper noticed that his fish in a tank across from his octopus tank kept disappearing. He finally set up a camera and found out that his octopus was crawling out of its tank,  crawling across the floor and into the other tank. It would eat one of the fish and then sneak back to his own tank!

Octopus moms lay eggs and stay with them until they hatch. She may not even get to eat! Baby octopus are so tiny! As soon as they hatch. They go looking for something to eat. Soon they grow into big octopuses and swim away.

I have attached a couple videos and a coloring page. I hope you like our visit with octopuses!

Love Papaw.

Why Does Ice Float?

It’s really hot outside and you go into the house to get something cold to drink. You get your favorite cup and put in some ice. Then you fill it with your water favorite drink. You may not notice, but the ice is floating at the top. You might think “duh, it always does that”. But did you know ice floating is really unusual? Water is one of the few substances that expands when it freezes. Only a few rare metals can do that. 

So what’s the big deal? Well, if ice didn’t float, life would probably cease to exist on our planet. Imagine a lake where the ice sinks after it freezes. Ice actually acts like insulation and helps keep the water down below from getting colder.  Without an ice layer,  water can keep getting colder and colder and the lake would freeze all the way down. All the fish and plants would die.

In the ocean, ice that freezes on the surface is actually fresh water. If it sank, fresh water would keep sinking to the bottom and the ocean would get saltier and saltier until nothing could live in it. 

So how does ice expand? When water is a liquid, the molecules can slide past each other up close. But when it freezes, it forms a crystal structure. Imagine you have a bunch of friends over. How many can you get in your room? Probably a lot. But what if you had to join hands with your arms straight out? This is kind of like a crystal structure. Now you can’t fit as many in the same space. Density is how much matter (or friends) you can fit in a certain space. The less friends, the less you all weigh. If you weigh less but take up the same space you would be less dense and would “float” (well, if you were ice).

If this is still confusing, that’s ok. Even high school students get confused over it too. Maybe this site can help. 

https://www.thoughtco.com/why-does-ice-float-604304

Ok, now I’m thirsty. Time to go get a cold bottle of water! 

Love,

Papaw

Pismo Clams

Did you know that Pismo California used to be known as the clam capital of the world? In the 1940-50s clams were a huge part of the growth of the city of Pismo. The largest clam ever found was over 7 inches long. That’s a big clam! They now have to be at least 4 1/2 inches to take. Back then people would fill carts with large clams and make chowder or sell them to restaurants that would prepare them for tourists. Even the indigenous tribes that came to the coast ate them before California was even a state.

For a while it looked like we would run out of them. People took so many that they became hard to find. Around 2020 the populations started to increase. Now you can see lots of small to mid-sized clams. If you happen to did up an undersized one, it’s important to rebury it so that it doesn’t get washed up on shore and die. It’s an important step in keeping the population healthy. 

There is still a clam festival in Pismo every year In mid October where you can sample chowder, fried clams, and other dishes made from these mollusks. There is even a parade! Mema and I love clam chowder, especially in a bread bowl. Be sure to ask her if she would make you some when you come to visit us. (That way I can have some too!) 

Well, gotta go to the beach. Have a fun day!

Love Papaw.