Lately the girls have been very excited to come home from school and show me the science experiments they’ve been doing in school. The DIY Lava Lamp was one Nutty did and today’s Floating M&M Experiment is one Tottie did.
For this experiment all you need is a glass of cold water and M&M candies.
Drop one or more M&Ms into the cold water and wait…
…and wait…you’ll see that the candy loses it’s color and begins to turn white.
Continue waiting (about 10 minutes or so). Do not disturb the water. You might see tiny bubbles beginning to form on the candy and you’ll see some chocolate starting to peak through.
Suddenly you’ll see bits of shell start to break lose and the “M” will rise off of the candy!
It’s kinda cool!
This Floating M&M Experiment works because of water solubility. The hard candy coating that contains the printed “M” is not water soluble. While the rest of the shell (the part that contains the color) dissolves in water and leaves a ring at the bottom, the hard coating rises to the top.
