Transcript
READTHEORY Name Date
A Bag of Ice Cream There is nothing better than ice cream on a hot day—except maybe homemade ice cream on a hot day. Making your own ice cream is easy if you have an electric ice cream maker. However, not everyone has an ice cream machine at home. Ice cream makers are not cheap. They are also fairly large. Not everyone has the money to buy an ice cream maker or enough space for one in the kitchen. Luckily, there is an easy way to make ice cream at home without using an ice cream machine. Once you have an ice cream base, all you need is ice, salt, and two freezer bags: one large (gallon-size) and one small (pint-size). First, you need to make the ice cream base. You can make any flavor of ice cream that you would like, but if you want to start with something simple, you can try this recipe for plain vanilla. All you will need is 1 tablespoon of sugar, ½ cup of cream, and ¼ teaspoon of vanilla extract. Mix these ingredients together in a bowl and then pour it into the pint-size freezer bag. Seal this bag carefully. Next, fill the gallon-size freezer bag halfway with ice. Then, get ½ cup of salt. Regular table salt will do the job, but salt with larger crystals (like Kosher salt or rock salt) will work best. Put the pint-size bag with the ice cream base into the gallon-size bag. Make sure that it is completely covered with ice. Seal the gallon bag. For the next step, you will need to shake the gallon bag as hard as you can for at least five full minutes. If the bag is too cold or slippery, you can use a towel or rubber gloves to make it easier to hold. Shaking is an important step in making ice cream. If you were just to put the ice cream mix into the freezer, large ice crystals would form in the mix. When this happens, you end up with a solid brick of frozen cream. Shaking the bag prevents large ice crystals from forming in the freezer. When you shake the ice cream while it is being frozen, the large crystals get broken into smaller crystals. This makes your ice cream softer and easy to scoop. After shaking the mixture for five minutes, open up the bags and check on your frozen dessert. Be careful when you open the pint-size bag so that you do not get any salt into your ice cream. If your ice cream is too soft, seal up the bags again and keep shaking. If the ice cream is just right (or if you simply cannot wait any longer), you can pour it into a bowl. It may be easier for you to turn the bag inside out than to try scooping it out with a spoon. After the ice cream is in a bowl, you are ready for the final and best step: eat your ice cream!
1) The author says that some people do not have an ice cream machine at home because ice cream machines I. take up a lot of space II. cost a lot of money III. are hard to use A. II only B. III only
C. I and II D. I, II, and III
2) According to the passage, what will happen if you just put your ice cream mixture into the freezer without shaking it first? A. your ice cream will turn into a solid block B. your ice cream will be too soft C. you will get salt into your ice cream D. the bag will be too slippery to hold
3) As used in paragraph 4, what is the best synonym for prevents? A. spins B. hides C. helps D. stops
4) The author apparently thinks that A. store-bought ice cream tastes just as good as homemade ice cream B. vanilla is the most delicious flavor of ice cream C. making homemade ice cream is not hard to do D. ice cream made in a bag tastes better than ice cream made in an ice cream maker
5) Which of the following choices lists the steps of making homemade ice cream in the correct order? A. put the smaller bag into the gallon-size bag, pour the ice cream base into the smaller bag, eat the ice cream B. pour the ice cream base into the smaller bag, put the smaller bag into the gallon-size bag, shake the bags C. make the ice cream base, shake the bags, fill the larger bag with ice and salt D. put the smaller bag into the gallon-size bag, fill the larger bag with ice and salt, pour the ice cream base into the smaller bag
6) In your own words, explain why you cannot simply make ice cream by putting cream in the freezer.
7) Would you ever be interested in making ice cream using plastic bags? Why or why not?
Answers and Explanations 1) C Question Type: Research In the first paragraph, the author writes: “Making your own ice cream is easy if you have an electric ice cream maker. However, not everyone has an ice cream machine at home.” The author then explains why some people do not own an ice cream maker. The author tells us that ice cream makers are “fairly large” and says that not everyone has “enough space for one in the kitchen.” Ice cream makers take up a lot of space. This supports option (I).
The author tells us that “ice cream makers are not cheap” and that “not everyone has the money to buy an ice cream machine.” Ice cream makers cost a lot of money. This supports option (II).
The author never says that using an ice cream maker is hard. In fact, he or she says: “Making your own ice cream is easy if you have an electric ice cream maker.” This eliminates option (III).
Therefore (C) is correct.
2) A Question Type: Research To answer this detail question correctly, we must find the place in the passage where the author explains why you need to shake the ice cream mixture. A good strategy for doing this is to scan the first few sentences of each paragraph, because these sentences usually tell us what the rest of the paragraph is about. In paragraph 4, the author writes: “For the next step, you will need to shake the gallon bag as hard as you can for at least five full minutes.” Because the author mentions shaking the bag in the first sentence, we can guess that this paragraph will tell us why shaking the bag is important. As the paragraph continues, the author writes: “If you were just to put the ice cream mix into the freezer, large ice crystals would form in the mix. When this happens, you end up with a solid brick of frozen cream. Shaking the bag prevents large ice crystals from forming in the freezer.” According to the author, if you do not shake the bag, the ice cream mix will turn into a solid block. Therefore (A) is correct.
The passage does not provide evidence to support answers (B), (C), or (D). Therefore they are incorrect.
3) D Question Type: Vocabulary prevent (verb): to keep something from happening; to put a stop to, end, avoid, or avert.
In paragraph 4, the author writes: “Shaking the bag prevents large ice crystals from forming in the ice cream.” We can use context clues—hints from known words or phrases around the unknown
word or phrase—to help us figure out what the word prevents most nearly means. The author explains in paragraph 4 why it is important to shake the bag of ice while making the ice cream. The author says “if you were just to put the ice cream mix into the freezer, large ice crystals would form in the mix. When this happens, you end up with a solid brick of frozen cream. Shaking the bag prevents large ice crystals from forming in the freezer. When you shake the ice cream while it is being frozen, the large crystals get broken into smaller crystals. This makes your ice cream softer and easy to scoop.” According to the author, ice cream should be soft and easy to scoop. If you put the mix into the freezer without shaking it, it would turn into a solid block because large ice crystals would form. Shaking the mix keeps it from turning solid by breaking the large crystals into smaller crystals. You need to shake the mix to stop the large ice crystals from forming. Based on this information, we can tell that we are looking for a word that means to stop or keep from happening. Therefore (D) is correct.
Based on the above information, we can tell that we are looking for a word that means to stop or keep from happening. Spinning is not the same as stopping. Therefore (A) is incorrect.
Based on the above information, we can tell that we are looking for a word that means to stop or keep from happening. Hiding is not the same as stopping. Therefore (B) is incorrect.
Based on the above information, we can tell that we are looking for a word that means to stop or keep from happening. Helping is not the same as stopping. Therefore (C) is incorrect.
4) C Question Type: Reasoning In the first paragraph, the author says that “making your own ice cream is easy if you have an electric ice cream maker.” The author then adds “there is an easy way to make ice cream at home without using an ice cream machine.” The author uses the word “easy” to describe how to make ice cream both with a machine and without one. Therefore, we can guess that the author thinks that making homemade ice cream is not hard to do. Therefore (C) is correct.
In the first paragraph, the author says: “There is nothing better than ice cream on a hot day—except maybe homemade ice cream on a hot day.” Based on this sentence, we can guess that the author thinks that homemade ice cream is better than store-bought ice cream. Therefore (A) is incorrect.
In paragraph 2, the author writes: “You can make any flavor of ice cream that you would like, but if you want to start with something simple, you can try this recipe for plain vanilla.” The author gives us a recipe for vanilla ice cream, but not because he or she thinks that vanilla is the most delicious flavor. The author gives us a recipe for vanilla ice cream so that readers can “start with something simple.” Therefore (B) is incorrect.
Although the author talks about how easy it is to make ice cream using bags instead of an ice cream maker, he or she never says that bag-made ice cream is more delicious. Therefore (D) is incorrect.
5) B Question Type: Research In paragraph 2, the author writes: “First, you need to make the ice cream base.” Then, readers should pour the mixture into “the pint-size freezer bag.” In paragraph 3, the author tells readers to fill the gallon-size bag with ice and salt and then “put the pint-size bag with the ice cream mixture into the gallon-size bag.” In paragraph 4, the author writes: “For the next step, you will need to shake the gallon bag as hard as you can for at least five full minutes.” In the final paragraph, the author says that the last step is to: “eat your ice cream.” Based on this information, we can see that the correct order is: make the ice cream base, pour it in the smaller bag, fill the bigger bag with ice and salt, put the smaller bag in the gallon-size bag, shake the bag, and eat the ice cream. Therefore (B) is correct.
The passage does not provide evidence to support answers (A), (C), or (D). Therefore they are incorrect.
