LaunchPAD teaches more than fun

That's the lesson Ava DuBois, 5, and Riley Roder, 7, discovered the hard way.

The Sioux City girls were attempting to use a peeler on a particularly uncooperative apple.

"We were going one way but the apple went the other way," Ava said, picking up the Red Delicious off of the floor.

Luckily, LaunchPAD Children's Museum discover guide Sara Bunker came to the rescue.

"You have to make sure the corer is right on top of the apple," she said, achieving some amazing apple peeling acuity. "That way, you'll get a perfect cut every time."

It seems like Bunker has the golden touch when it comes to  slicing an dicing produce but the Plattsmouth, Nebraska, native's true expertise comes in teaching kids to cook.

Ava, Riley and approximately a dozen other children, ages 5 - 8, were students in a Kitchen Chemistry class that Bunker was teaching at LaunchPAD's  623 Pearl St., facilities.

"When I was a kid, I had a terrible diet," Bunker admitted. "However as a an adult, I consider myself a but of a 'foodie.' I'm teaching this class because I wanted to share my love of healthy eating when children are the most receptive of the subject."

Specifically, Bunker wanted her students to know where their food came from. 

From planting pumpkin and sunflower seeds in pots of dirt to mastering simple recipes, she wants to turn the enthusiastic bunch of kids into "Master Chefs"-in-the-making.

It looked like Sebastian Pratt, 7, has some Gordon Ramsay-level skills going on. Well, at least, he had no issue coring the multiple apples that will be used in Bunker's applesauce recipe. 

"This is a lot of fun," the Sioux City boy said, scooping goop away from the peeler. "Boy, apples have a bunch of seeds."

Yet, Bunker quickly pointed out that apple seeds are edible.

"Do you know what other fruit has seeds we can eat?" she asked her culinary kids. "Tomatoes have seeds we can eat."

That thought proved perplexing for Ashlie Rehal, 8, who was working under the assumption that tomatoes were veggies, not fruits.

"No tomatoes are definitely fruit," Bunker said to a still not completely convinced Ashlie. 

Well, if this fruity factoid wasn't fodder for some foodie fact-finding, perhaps this additional noshy nugget of news will blow the minds of our young "Iron Chefs."

"OK, kids, what live fungi do we put in breads and cakes?" Bunker asked.

If you said the correct answer is yeast (aka "Saccharomyces Cerevisiae" or sugar-eating fungus), then pat yourself on the back.

Indeed, LaunchPAD's young kitchen chemists conducted an experiment utilizing yeast.

Mia DuBois, 7, added yeast to a plastic bottle containing a teaspoon of sugar and a slug of warm water. The Sioux City girl placed a balloon on top of the bottle, swirled the bottle around for a bit and, then, waited a few minutes.

Slowly, the balloon began to inflate as the yeast "ate" the sugar.

"That's cool," Mia said, liking the result of her experiment.

In fact, she'd like to conduct a similar experiment when she grows up.

"I'd like to become a teacher some day," Mia said with certainty.

Her LaunchPAD classmate, Bennett Hartman, 4, of Sioux City, has very different adult aspirations.

"I want to become a scientist when I grow up," he said.

Wait, a food scientist, by chance?

"Nope," Bennett answered. "I wanna be a bug scientist. I wanna work with bugs."