Today is Missouri’s birthday, and what better way to celebrate than with a waffle cone? After all, waffle cones were invented here in 1904. It was another great accidental food invention. An ice cream vendor at the World’s Fair ran out of paper cups. The friendly waffle maker next door rolled a thin waffle into a cone, and they stuck the ice cream inside. Everyone liked that a lot more than holding melting ice cream in their hands. There’s another handy invention from here that we can eat: sliced bread! You might’ve heard the expression “the greatest thing since sliced bread.” Well, that actually means the greatest thing since 1928. That’s when the Chillicothe Baking Company first started selling pre-sliced loaves of bread. But ice cream still tastes better on a waffle.
Wee ones: Can you roll a piece of paper into a cone shape? Try it!
Little kids: If you can fit 3 scoops of ice cream in a waffle cone, 2 scoops in a normal cone, and 2 scoops in a dish, how many scoops do you have in total? Bonus: If the waffle cone was invented in 1904, is it more or less than 100 years old?
Big kids: A 3rd bready invention from Missouri is instant pancake mix! If the box calls for 2 cups of the dry mix and 1 1/2 cups of water, but you only want to make 1/2 of that, how much water do you need? Bonus: If pancake mix saves you 2 seconds of cooking time per pancake and sliced bread saves you 3 seconds per sandwich, in which scenario do you save more time: cooking 64 pancakes or making 44 sandwiches?
Answers:
Wee ones: Try it out together!
Little kids: 7 scoops, because 3 + 2 + 2 = 7. Bonus: It’s more than 100 years old, because 1904 + 100 = 2004, and we’re in 2019.
Big kids: 3/4 cups of water. 1 1/2 cups of water is 3/2 cups, which is the same as 6/4 cups – and that’s a lot easier to cut in half. If you have 6 things, half of that pile is 3, so 1/2 of 6/4 = 3/4. Bonus: You save 4 more seconds when making the sandwiches, because 44 x 3 = 132 (40 x 3 = 120 + 4 x 3 = 12), and 64 x 2 = 128.
