South Pole Sweets: Snow Cap Crunch

For our cooking project this week we know we will have to come up with something frozen. It’s Antarctica after all! So ice cream is the obvious choice and the kids excited to think up a flavor that will reflect the South Pole’s arctic climate. We are also happy to read that ice cream is the perfect choice because it is a favorite treat among the scientists that are stationed in Antarctica, according to the book Continents: Antarctica. Visitors to Antarctica burn a tremendous amount of calories (up to 6000 on average) because their bodies are burning additional calories to stay warm while they work outside. Divers burn even more calories because they are swimming in near freezing water. As a result, scientists consume quite a bit more calories in Antarctica then they would back home, and ice cream is one of the most popular choices when they are back at the research station. Chocolate bars are the meal of choice when they are out on the ice!

We decide to call our ice cream Snow Cap Crunch.Vanilla ice cream with Sno Caps and Andes Candies for that arctic chill. Here’s how we make it:

First we freeze the canister for the ice cream maker over night. We make sure that all of our ingredients are cold and ready to combine.

Add 1-1/2 cups of whole milk, 1-1/8 cups of granulated sugar, 3 cups of heavy cream and 1-1/2 tablespoons of pure vanilla extract to the ice cream maker.

Turn it on and watch it start to mix up the ingredients.

Set the timer for 30 minutes. This is what it looks like a few minutes in…

While it’s mixing get the candy ready…

We sample the Sno Caps. Yum!

And dice up the Andes Candies. We think HZ is going to be a chef one day because he can chop like a pro!

Toss the toppings into the ice cream while it churns (and after at least 30 minutes).

This is what it looks like about 35 minutes in…

Ready for a quick sample! The rest will need to go into a container to freeze overnight.

And here’s what it looks like the next day:

Yum!!! The kids wish they could be scientists on Antarctica and eat ice cream every day too!

Week 7–Antarctica–Brrr!

We can’t believe that it is already here–our last week of continents. The weeks have flown by, and so has our summer. Luckily we saved the coolest continent for last and the kids are excited to learn about life (what little there is) on Antarctica.

Antarctica is the coldest, driest (it’s actually considered a desert), and windiest continent on Earth. From our children’s atlas we learn that 98% of the continent is covered in ice and snow, and each winter the continent doubles in size as the coastal water freezes around it. Because of the extreme weather conditions, and the lack of permanent civilization, we expect it to be challenging to find children’s books on Antarctica, but are happy to come across several at our library. Actually we find more books on Antarctica than we did on many of the countries in Asia and Africa:

From Continents: Antarctica we learn interesting facts about its climate. According to the book, if Antarctica’s ice sheets melted, the oceans of the earth would rise by about 215 feet! (The kids don’t like the sounds of this, as we live so close to the water!) Like Australia, the seasons on Antarctica are opposite ours because it sits in the southern hemisphere. Winter can reach lows of -94 degrees and summers barely makes it above 0 degrees Fahrenheit. Yikes! Nonetheless there is one hot spot and that’s Mount Erebus, Antarctica’s active volcano. We wonder what it would be like for the volcano to erupt and have molten lava pour over the mountains of ice. The kids debate whether the lava would freeze or the ice would melt…

The frigid climate make it impossible for humans to inhabit the continent long term, but there is evidence that our ancestors were aware of the cold land and in 10 AD Ptolemy named it Terra Australis Incognita, which translates to “unknown southern land.” Later it was named Antarctica which means “opposite of the bear” in Greek. The Bear (Ursa Major) is a constellation in the northern hemisphere. In the 17 and 1800’s explorers came close enough to see the icebergs of Antarctica, but it wasn’t until the beginning of the 20th century that humans successfully reached and travelled across the continent. Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen was the first person to step foot on the south pole. He reached it on December 14, 1911 and left a Norwegian flag on the spot.

Since then many scientists have spent time on Antarctica studying the earth’s atmosphere and our Great Uncle is one of them. In fact he has a mountain named after him! It is located between the lower David Valley and Bartley Glacier in the Asgard Range of Victoria Land. We look it up on the internet and find a Norwegian weather website that gives us today’s weather on the mountain: current temp. Brrrr!

The kids spend some time reading through some of the books we’ve taken out of Antarctica and we think about crafts and projects we can do for the week ahead. We will have to get a little creative for Antarctica, which is always fun!