A spoon that sprays your mouth with your favorite flavor

Flavor Capsules

You’ve chosen to imagine a spoon that sprays almost any flavor into your mouth. You might want to learn more about flavor capsules, which protect tiny flavors until they’re released. Which flavor capsule would you choose: stinky feet or rotten milk?

Fun Facts:

Some chewing gums use one flavor that comes out quickly and another trapped flavor that comes out later. That means the gum can actually change flavors while you chew!
Sipahh straws contain tiny flavor ingredients that dissolve as milk travels through the straw, changing the milk's flavor before it reaches your mouth.
Scientists have trapped limonene, which helps give citrus fruits their smell and flavor, inside protective coatings so it lasts longer.

Flavor Capsules

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We’re exploring flavor capsules, also called flavor microencapsulation. Tiny coatings can surround flavors, protecting them and helping control when those flavors are released. Food makers already use this idea in real products, and future tools might release chosen flavors right when we eat. So which flavor capsule would you choose: stinky feet or rotten milk?

Fun Facts:

Pop Rocks began with a 1956 experiment by General Foods chemist William Mitchell. He found a way to trap carbon dioxide inside candy, making it pop when eaten.
Scientists are studying ingredients such as pea protein and plant fibers to make the protective walls around tiny flavors.
In 2009, Harvard professor David Edwards created Le Whif, a tiny device that puffed chocolate particles into your mouth. Its creators said the particles were designed to be large enough to avoid traveling deeply into the lungs.
Researchers have turned the flavor of durian—a famously strong-smelling fruit from Southeast Asia—into tiny coated particles using spray drying and freeze drying.
Researchers have designed tiny flavor capsules that melt at the temperature inside your mouth. They can make an ice cream start with one flavor and then reveal another!

Discussion Question:

What might change if almost any healthy food could taste completely different?

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Physical Build:

Design your own flavor-spraying spoon using cardboard, foil, straws, tape, and markers. Add buttons or dials for different flavors and invent a way to control how much flavor comes out. Then draw three foods you would test it on and decide whether every food needs a flavor makeover.

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Digital Build:

With an adult, ask ChatGPT:

“Invent five surprising flavors a future spoon could spray onto food.”

Choose your favorites, invent a few of your own, and draw a menu showing which foods you would pair with each flavor.

or a cup that turns any drink into the perfect temperature?

Perfect Temp Cup

Smart Drinkware

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You’ve chosen to imagine a cup that makes every drink exactly your favorite temperature. You might want to learn more about smart drinkware, which uses technology to control temperature. Just don’t let your mug get too smart, or it might learn how to grow legs and walk away with your hot cocoa!

Fun Facts:

Long before today's smart mugs, inventors created containers that could heat food without a stove. Some used separate chemicals that made heat when they were mixed.
In experiments, simply warming plain water on the tongue made some people report a sweet taste—even though there was no sugar in it.
The OHOM Ui Mug sits on a special pad that uses electricity and magnets to keep your drink warm.

Smart Drinkware

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We’re learning more about smart drinkware, which can control a drink’s temperature. Sensors can check how warm a drink is and built-in heaters can then help hold a chosen temperature. Other designs could use thermoelectric parts to move heat in or out, giving us more control over every sip. Future cups might even switch between warming and cooling. Just don’t let your mug get too smart, or it might learn how to grow legs and walk away with your hot cocoa!

Fun Facts:

In 1892, Scottish scientist James Dewar invented a special flask with almost no air between its two walls. The empty space slowed heat from getting in or out and was meant to keep liquids cold during science experiments.
Scientists tested sweet, salty, and sour liquids at different temperatures. The warmer sweet liquid tasted sweeter than the cooler versions.
In a 2025 experiment, researchers changed the rim of a cup by only 2°C. People reported differences in how some drinks tasted and felt.
Ember mugs have sensors inside their walls that check the drink's temperature. Their heaters then help keep the drink at the temperature you chose.
The OHOM Ui Mug sits on a special pad that uses induction heating to keep your drink warm. That's a way of making heat using electricity and magnets.

Discussion Question:

If a smart cup uses electricity for every drink, when would the extra convenience be worth the energy?

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Physical Build:

Create a perfect-temperature cup prototype using a paper cup, cardboard, foil, tape, and markers. Add pretend temperature sensors, warming and cooling parts, and a simple control that lets you choose “cold,” “warm,” or something in between. Then invent one feature that could help your cup use less energy.

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Digital Build:

With an adult, ask ChatGPT:

“Invent a future cup with three clever ways to control a drink’s temperature.”

Choose the ideas you like, change anything you don’t, and draw your own version with buttons, sensors, or other controls.