Cabbage Chemistry: Students Explore Fermentation with Kimchi

With a project from Science Buddies, these middle school students turned their interest in food science into a flavorful science fair project that combined chemistry, fermentation, and teamwork.

Food Science for the STEM Fair

For their 7th-grade science fair project, Abby and Katilyn, students at St. John the Baptist Catholic School in Milpitas, CA, wanted a food science project that felt exciting and different. Curious about fermentation, they chose the Kimchi Chemistry project at Science Buddies and got ready to explore the power of sour.

For their project, they made two types of kimchi, red and white, and observed how the flavors and acidity changed over the course of a month. They tracked pH levels, did taste tests, and, when one of the jars popped open early, shared with their classmates.

"Kimchi was definitely a very cool food to work with," they say. "It had no taste at all, and we were scared it was not going to taste good in the end. But as the red kimchi fermented, it was very good and acidic." Things didn't go quite so well with the white kimchi. "It honestly just tasted salty with fish sauce."

They were careful with their procedure, knowing that the order of the steps was critical. "If the steps were not right, the kimchi would not be good." They had trouble getting accurate pH readings from the red kimchi because of its color, but they stuck with the project and are proud of what they accomplished. "It tasted very good!"

Neither student had made kimchi before. For a previous STEM fair, Abby did a project related to pickles and says she created some very sour pickles. Kaitlyn experimented with the science behind making body scrubs and deodorant.

The best part of the STEM fair this year? "Having fun working with each other and getting to make kimchi for the first time!"

With hands-on experiments like Kimchi Chemistry, Science Buddies helps students connect classroom learning with personal interests. As Abby and Kaitlyn discovered, science can be delicious!

Thank you to Abby and Kaitlyn for sharing their STEM project story with Science Buddies. If you have a story about doing a Science Buddies project or how Science Buddies makes a difference in your classroom or program, reach out to us at [email protected].