You Can Eat Snow, But Should You?
By Jo Gabriel and Angalina Thane
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Picture this: you’re stranded in a cold, arctic tundra. Your coat is ripped, and you have no food and water. Your hunting skills are dismal. So what do you do? Well, you have all of this snow around you. It’s just frozen water, so that should keep you hydrated, right? WRONG!!!
As it turns out, the difference between regular water and frozen water is a very large one for your body. When you drink water, it is already in its prime form to keep up that 75% water content you need to survive. However, eating snow takes a whole lot more energy. Not only does your body need to melt it down for use, but it also needs to keep you warm so that you don’t get hypothermia. By the time the snow is all nicely melted, you've ended up even more dehydrated than you were before! So if it really takes that much energy, you could just melt it down and then drink it, yeah? NO!!!
All snowflakes form around a center made of tiny foreign material, called a nucleator. This nucleator could range from some harmless pollen to a speck of dust, to horrific airborne bacteria and fungus. Pay close attention to that last one, because it means that eating a handful of snow is like playing Russian roulette with infectious diseases. While many bacteria die from the cold temperatures before ever making it into a person’s stomach, it’s still a safe bet to boil your snow into water before drinking, since the heat will ensure they’re all dead. You’d better hope that someone left an electric stove lying around that tundra somewhere, or else you’re kind of screwed.
But, ignoring all that dehydration and airborne disease, this winter weather has fostered some delicious recipes that anyone can make and enjoy for themselves! To avoid eating snow straight off the ground, gather some big buckets, and set up your toppings outside so you don’t lose any of your precious bounty to the warmth. Snow by itself in the air is one thing, but snow sitting on the dirty sidewalk is another. Most importantly, avoid yellow snow at all costs, no matter how appetizing it looks.
Once you’ve actually got your snow, there’s a wide, wonderful array of delicious recipes you can try:
Two-ingredient snow ice cream, in which all you need is a gallon of clean, fresh snow and one (14 ounce) can of sweetened condensed milk. Just mix the two together and you’ve got enough snow ice cream to serve eight people. If you want to spice it up a little, try adding your favorite fruits as flavorful toppings.
Sugar on snow, a chewy textured candy which is a New England favorite, that they call “leather aprons” or “leather britches”. This recipe calls for fresh snow (noticing a pattern?), maple syrup and popsicle sticks. This time however, collecting your snow in a tray instead of a bucket would be ideal. Heat your maple syrup in a pan to about 234 degrees Fahrenheit and drizzle it in strips over packed snow. This causes it to cool rapidly enough for the maple syrup to form a taffy-like texture that can be swirled onto a popsicle stick.
And perhaps the most interesting recipe, spicy honey candy with sea salt. Including a few more ingredients than fresh snow, preferably in a deep tray or shallow bowl, you’ll want to grab 1 cup of honey and 1 teaspoon of vanilla, as well as some Cayenne pepper and sea salt to taste. Mix the honey, vanilla and cayenne pepper in a small bowl to your desired level of heat. Then pour globs of your honey mixture into your clean snow, and roll them around until they form into balls. Remove them from your tray, sprinkle them with a dash of sea-salt if you fancy, and dig in!
So, if you decide to ignore all the possible side-effects and are just looking for a fun, tasty way to pass time through the winter, whip up some tasty snow recipes. Just watch out for those infectious diseases; they totally ruin the flavor!
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