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Food Chemistry: Gummy Juice Noodles

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Today is the coolest food chemistry experiment ever- Homemade Gummy Juice Noodles. We turned juice into a solid gummy noodle-y string!  We like food-related experiments! My kids like to call them “joodles”.

(Check out a couple of my other kitchen chemistry experiments: Cake Chemistry, Rock Candy Geodes, Homemade Butter in a Jar)

Food Chemistry Turn Juice into Noodles!

I came across an experiment a while back that turns juice into spheres (little balls) and I really wanted to try it out. These juice spheres are made in fancy restaurants all the time. They look like little caviar balls.

Instead of spheres, we did our own spin on it though and made them into gummy juice noodles! I have to say that this experiment was pretty amazing. My kids even called it “EPIC”.

Food Chemistry: How to Make Gummy Juice Noodles

juice noodles supplies

 

Watch how we made the noodles:

 

To make these gummy juice noodles, you will need a few specialized ingredients, that I could only find online: Sodium Alginate and Calcium Chloride.  If you want to get high tech, they have special (and super awesome) spherification tools you can buy, too. We stuck to a regular syringe.

Tools & Supplies: 

Sodium Alginate (gelling agent)
Calcium Chloride
Blender
Juice
Glass Bowls
Syringe

 

To start, measure out 1 c. of juice. I used 2 different kinds to add some color variety in our experiment. Mix 1 tsp of sodium alginate into the juice. Blend it in a blender to remove any lumps. It will start to thicken. Let it rest for at least an hour to let the bubbles escape.

kitchen chemistry experiment with juice

 

After the juice and alginate mixture has rested for a time, it is time to make the juicy noodles. You will need a large pan full of water mixed with the calcium chloride. I mixed in a teaspoon or two of the calcium in the water. You will also want another bowl of fresh, plain water that you can use to rinse the noodles when they are done.

 

 

Using a syringe, collect the juice mixture and squirt it into the calcium-water solution. In the presence of calcium, the sodium alginate forms into a gel.

juicy gummy noodles kitchen experiment

 

 

This is where it was supposed to be droplets, but ours came out in long strings (probably due to my inaccurate measurements).

gummy noodles made of juice

 

Remove them from the pan and rinse in the fresh water.

juice gummy noodles experiment

Now your kids can dive in and taste them. Sometimes they come out in blobs instead of strings, but both are fun to taste and play with.

 

Then we just placed them on a plate and the kids ate them.  They tasted just like gummies and my kids LOVED them! Plus, they are much better for you when you make them of 100% juice.

 

gummy juice noodles kitchen chemistry

I am not certain how long they would last, but if you refrigerate them, I think they would last a few days.


 

 

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Comments

  4. Kathy says

    so fun!!! Do you know what the chemical reaction is? Why it does it? Looking for a neat experiment for my daughter for her science fair. She needs to explain and understand so I was just wondering if you know why it happens.

    • Diana Skiles says

      This is about cross-linking polymers. For a science fair experiment, the variable you experiment with could be to compare the behavior of the sodium alginate mixture in a calcium chloride solution vs how it behaves in a sodium chloride solution. Or, what happens when you put the noodles you made using the calcium chloride solution into a sodium chloride solution. Your young scientist can research what accounts for the different behavior – and learn about ions and cross-linking polymers.

  9. Melanie says

    Where did you get the Sodium Alginate and Calcium Chloride? Sadly I’m thinking this could be an awesome healthy fruit snack for me if I use 100% juice.

  10. Deanna says

    I was going to do this for a chemistry experiment and thought in would work with gelatin, it didn’t. So don’t try to substitute, use the sodium alginate!!!

  12. ian mcmahon says

    the spheres are more likely if the syringe delivers smaller drops into the calcium chloride solution. While a safety issue, a needle that fits the syringe will do this effectively or if you have access to plastic pasteur pipettes then cut off the bulb and place the shaft over the nozzle of the syringe. No, you wont get large spheres unless perhaps dip the end of the needle or pipette below the surface then slowly push the plunger – something to play around with. The alginate solution will last for about a week – perhaps refrigerate to improve this

  13. Heather Stephenson says

    Do you know how many batches of this you could do with the 2 oz packages that you linked? I would like to try this for a class but am unsure how much of the Sodium Alginate and Calcium Chloride I would need to purchase.

  14. Rachel says

    We are needing to make an invention for my son’s school and I’m wondering if these would melt in hot water? For our idea, we are trying to make a liquid product into a solid (not frozen), but then it needs to melt when put in hot water like coffee or tea. Do you think these would do that?

  16. Raquel V. says

    what size syringe did you use? and what is the chemical reaction that happened? I want to teach this to kids, so need those details 🙂

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