RUBEN MEERMAN: What are YOU doing?
ELLIOT: Eating.
RUBEN MEERMAN: Hm. Eating what?
ELLIOT: Cereal!
RUBEN MEERMAN: In the afternoon? Cereal is meant for breakfast.
ELLIOT: And as an after-school TV snack. Hasn't science taught you anything?
RUBEN MEERMAN: Mm. Yes, it has, actually. Bring that bowl over to the desk, and the big container full of it, and I'll show you. But first, tell me about the cereal you're eating. What's in it?
ELLIOT: Food!
RUBEN MEERMAN: Of course there's food in it. It is food. Tell me about the extra stuff the manufacturer says they've added to your cereal.
ELLIOT: You mean toys and special offers? No way. I ain't sharing that with you.
RUBEN MEERMAN: (Sighs) No, I mean vitamins and minerals.
ELLIOT: Oh, now I'm with you. It contains extra iron.
RUBEN MEERMAN: Mm, perfect. Do you know why it's very important to have iron in your diet?
ELLIOT: So your bones show up on X-rays.
RUBEN MEERMAN: Mm, no. I'll explain in a minute. But first, let's find out just how much iron has been added to your cereal.
ELLIOT: Alright, what do we need?
RUBEN MEERMAN: We'll need… (Grunts) ..a mortar and a pestle — this thing here. You can use a bowl and spoon if you like. We'll need a little magnet to get the iron out. My magnet is on a dart you get with the magnetic dart set. Hold your thing-o out.
ELLIOT: A-ha-ha!
RUBEN MEERMAN: It sticks to it. You'll also need the lid of a margarine container and a little bit of cling wrap.
ELLIOT: OK. What next?
RUBEN MEERMAN: Now, give me some of your cereal. We'll pour it into my mortar and pestle. And… (Hums a fanfare) We'll crush this up using this big heavy mortar, right? We'll get it down to a fine powder. Here we go.
ELLIOT: This is going to take a while. Let's speed it up!
RUBEN MEERMAN: Right. Jeez, I put in a lot.
ELLIOT: Are you done?
RUBEN MEERMAN: Yes, I have now turned this into a fine powder. It looks like sand.
ELLIOT: Wow.
RUBEN MEERMAN: I know. Amazing.
ELLIOT: Now what?
RUBEN MEERMAN: We take the bit of cling wrap and wrap it around the magnet. Very important. And then we rub the magnet through this powder, right? We'll hold it like so. Here we go. Rub it through. Anything that's magnetic in this powder will now be sticking to my little powerful magnet. We'll rub it backwards and forwards.
ELLIOT: How long should you do this?
RUBEN MEERMAN: The longer you do it, the more you'll pick up because the powder is now pretty crushed up and the iron-y bits will be spread right throughout it. So I've got to try and rub right through as much as I possibly can. Let's have a look, shall we? There's probably a bit on there, but we'll do a little bit more. OK, now…
ELLIOT: What next, then?
RUBEN MEERMAN: What's next is I take this over here and take the cling wrap off over the top of my little piece of plastic here. And then, once the magnet is taken away, we can dust that off under there, get all the dust out so any magnetic bits are now on top of that. And then I take my magnet and put it underneath and I start rubbing it around.
ELLIOT: What?!
RUBEN MEERMAN: Can you see what's happening there?
ELLIOT: There's little… It looks like a little tiny spider.
RUBEN MEERMAN: I'm separating them out. There'll be a fair few bits, so I'll rub the magnet around underneath. And, ooh, here it comes.
ELLIOT: That is weird!
RUBEN MEERMAN: It is weird, isn't it? It's magnetic iron in your cereal.
ELLIOT: Oh! That's making me feel a little bit sick!
RUBEN MEERMAN: Well…
ELLIOT: That's in my cereal? Is that good for me?
RUBEN MEERMAN: Don't panic, because it's completely safe to eat this form of iron in this sort of amount. And the reason for adding it to cereals, it's to boost the amount of iron in your diet. Iron is naturally present in foods. You have to have it, it's very good for you. Not eating enough iron can make you feel really tired and you can even get a deficiency of iron called 'anaemia'.
ELLIOT: But should I be looking for iron in cereals like this or natural places? Which one's better?
RUBEN MEERMAN: Much better to get your iron from normal healthy food. This has been added to a mixture of sugar and other things. You're much better to get it from foods because there's other nutrients you need as well. It's not just iron you need. You need Vitamin C, A, B. They're not all necessarily in this food.
ELLIOT: Now, does our need for iron date back to the Iron Age where iron was the only source of food?
RUBEN MEERMAN: No, your incorrect understanding of the Iron Age has nothing to do with this, Elliot. Iron has lots of really important jobs in your diet. You need oxygen to get to your cells. Iron helps oxygen get from your lungs into your blood and to your cells. It's very important.
ELLIOT: This is a cool experiment. You know what I've learnt, Ruben?
RUBEN MEERMAN: What's that, Elliot?
ELLIOT: Iron men and women need more iron than most people. But the irony is that with all that swimming they actually run the risk of rusting.
RUBEN MEERMAN: Hm. Rusting iron men. Very funny. I get it. Here, play with your little magnet. See you next time. And lay off that sugary stuff.
