What's the Difference Between Sunscreen and Sunblock?

As a former food writer, I have a complicated relationship with seasonality. When you’re banned from writing about tomatoes and eggplant and corn outside the hours of late July to early September, you know what you want to do? You wanna write about tomatoes in December. 

So with What’s the Difference, we’re deciding that seasonality is a construct. (Unless it serves the purpose of a cute newsletter introduction—in that case, we love the seasons.) And unlike tomatoes in December, which are objectively gross, sunscreen and sunblock should be worn year-round! But before we get to skincare tips, let’s dig into the difference.

Sunscreen is a lotion that absorbs the sun’s ultraviolet (UV) rays; it contains chemicals that soak them up before they reach the skin. It’s therefore referred to as a chemical sunscreen. Sunscreens can have a wide range of active ingredients, but the good ones contain benzophenones, which protect against UVA rays (the ones that cause premature aging and wrinkling), and cinnamates and/or salicylates, which protect against UVB rays (the ones that cause sunburns). 

Sunblock, on the other hand, reflects the sun’s rays from the skin instead of absorbing them. It’s therefore thought of as a physical sunscreen. Sunblock is usually thicker and more opaque than sunscreen, and it can sometimes leave behind white residue. And although it’s heavier, sunblock’s active ingredients—titanium dioxide or zinc oxide—are gentler, making it a safer choice for people who have sensitive skin.

Dermatologists say that unless you have a personal preference, both sunscreen and sunblock are fine to use—one’s not better than the other. However, whatever you choose should have an SPF of at least 30 and protect against both UVA and UVB rays; if you see the term “broad spectrum” on the label, you’re good to go. And make sure to avoid suntan lotion, which is a different product altogether; it usually has an SPF of 15 or lower, and is made with oils that don’t protect your skin at all. You might want that sun-kissed look, but safety comes first—no matter what season it is.

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What's the Difference Between Courage and Bravery?

When we’re young, there are a group of virtues that pepper the lessons that we learn, the books that we read, the movies that we watch, the games that we play: Kindness. Compassion. Bravery. Courage. We’re taught to emulate these traits in our day-to-day lives: to do unto others, to always tell the truth, to stand up for what’s good and right. 

But the bigness of these qualities can overshadow any nuance, especially when there are mysteries to solve or villains to trick or princesses to save. So the small, but worthy distinctions between them—especially something as delicate as the difference between courage and bravery—are often left unsaid, until decades later when a newsletter pops into your inbox and sets the record straight.

Bravery is the ability to confront something painful or difficult or dangerous without any fear. It’s a quality, not a state of mind; it doesn’t need a cause to awaken it. Someone is brave—full stop. To the person who has it, it’s effortless; it’s eating a caterpillar on the playground because a friend dares you to, without a second thought. It’s jumping from the highest diving board without any hesitation. 

Courage, on the other hand, is the ability to confront something painful or difficult or dangerous despite any fear. It’s not a quality, but a choice; a person feels the fear or pain or danger, but chooses to persevere anyway. Unlike bravery, courage is driven by a cause; the courageous person believes that cause is worth standing up and fighting for, despite all the clear reasons not to. It takes a great effort, because what’s on the other end merits it.  

These differences can be traced back to the etymology of the words. The root word for bravery is the Italian word “bravo,” which means “bold” but also once meant “wild, savage.” The root word for courage, however, is “coeur”—the French word for “heart.”

So if you don’t consider yourself brave, don’t despair. When a cause is worthy enough—when you have something worth fighting for—that’s where courage steps in. Courage isn’t something you need to already have; it’s something you can find. 

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What's the Difference Between Corned Beef and Pastrami?

Here at What’s the Difference HQ, we’ve already covered the distinction between deli and appetizing and the intricacies of the appetizing case. But the deli counter has its own pressing questions—because while you may have some vague understanding that pastrami and corned beef are two different things, and that one might be better than the other, you may be stuck on the how or why. Here are the major points of differentiation between the two, because no meat should ever be a mystery. 

COUNTRY OF ORIGIN: Pastrami has two possible ancestries: it’s either Romanian (where its predecessor, pastrama, was made with pork or mutton) or Turkish (where it’d be a descendent of pastirma, made with beef). Corned beef hails from Ireland, which is why it's eaten on St. Patrick’s Day. 

CUT OF MEAT: Today’s corned beef and pastrami are both made from beef, albeit different parts of the animal. Corned beef is made from brisket, which comes from the lower chest of the cow; pastrami is either made from a cut called the deckle, a lean, wide, firm shoulder cut, or the navel, a smaller and juicier section right below the ribs. These days, you may also see pastrami made from brisket.

BRINE: Pastrami and corned beef are brined before they’re cooked; they’re either rubbed with or submerged in a solution of salt and spices to infuse the meat with more moisture and flavor. Both are brined in a mixture of salt, sugar, black pepper, cloves, coriander, bay leaves, juniper berries, and dill, as well as the preservatives sodium nitrate or sodium nitrite.

SPICE MIX: Here’s when things really start to differ. After brining, pastrami gets coated in a mixture of black pepper, coriander, mustard seeds, fennel seeds, and sometimes fresh garlic; that spice coating is what gives it its blackened appearance. Corned beef is… naked. No spice mix to speak of.

COOKING METHOD: Pastrami is smoked over hardwood, oftentimes with a pan of water nearby, which helps create steam and keep the meat moist. It’s then cooled and then steamed before serving. Corned beef is… boiled. Sometimes with cabbage and other accoutrements in the mix, too.

BONUS ROUND: If you’ve ever been to Montreal, you may be wondering: What does “smoked meat” have to do with all this? Smoked meat is a Canadian specialty that pulls from the same themes as corned beef and pastrami, but has a story arc of its own. It’s made with brisket and is brined in a mixture of black pepper, coriander, garlic, and mustard seeds—but with much less sugar than its pastrami and corned-beef cousins. It’s then smoked, like pastrami, and is best layered onto rye bread with mustard for serving—just like the rest of family. 

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What's the Difference Between a Castle and a Palace?

As a girl, I was never into princesses; I was more of the type to watch monster-truck videos with my brother and read almanacs for fun. However, as an adult, I find there’s something rather aspirational about the royal lifestyle, or at least the royal lifestyle of years’ past; who wouldn’t want to sit around eating teacakes and playing whist all day? I hereby present to you the differences between a castle and a palace—because if we can’t live like royals ourselves, we may as well know the terminology.

A castle is a large, fortified residence or group of buildings with strong walls to defend against attacks. In their heyday, they were inhabited by a royal or noble and used as a seat from which to control the surrounding area. Castles oftentimes have moats, peep-holes in the walls from which to shoot arrows, and other defense-centric architectural touches. They were first built by royalty during the Middle Ages throughout Europe and the Middle East, and served as fortresses to guard whoever was doing the ruling.

A palace, on the other hand, is designed simply for elegance, lavishness, and luxury. No fortified walls, no moats, no cannons—they’ve more of the gilded-chic vibe. Palaces were/are lived in by royalty, heads of state, or heads of a church, and are usually surrounded by lush, landscaped gardens. The first palaces were built on Palatine Hill in Rome, which is actually where the name “palace” comes from.

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What's the Difference Between Sleet, Hail, Graupel, and Wintry Mix?

No matter what background or tradition or religion or belief system you identify with, I think we can all agree: when crazy stuff starts falling from the sky, things get weird. Turns out there are so many crazy things falling from the sky these days that we now must expand our vocabulary. My friends, it’s time to get cozy with hail, sleet, graupel (yes—this is a real thing), and wintry mix.

But first: some background. Hail, sleet, graupel, and wintry mix are all forms of precipitation that start off as snow. Snow stays snow when the temperature between the clouds and the ground stays at around 32°F the entire way down; it’s when the temperature gets warmer somewhere en route that interesting stuff starts to happen.

Sleet is what forms when there are warmer temperatures in the air and near- or below-freezing temperatures on the ground, or when cold air “sandwiches” a pocket of warmer air. This combination causes snowflakes to melt on their way down and then re-freeze as they get closer to the ground, turning into translucent little pellets of ice.  

Graupel, on the other hand, happens when there are freezing temperatures in the air and above-freezing temperatures closer to the ground. Snowflakes get caked in near-frozen drops of rain, forming soft, opaque white balls akin to what the National Weather Service so aptly describes as “Dippin’ Dots.” For such an ugly name, I personally think graupel sounds quite lovely; it’s like snow on steroids, or like the pearl-sugar topping on a brioche, but soft.

Wintry mix, as one might guess, is a gross mix of snow, graupel, sleet, and freezing rain, because turns out multiple things can fall out of the sky at the same time! However, instead of the clouds spewing out a trail mix–like mixture, which would actually be kind of cool, we get any of those forms of precipitation falling in areas very close to each other, or switching off as the day progresses. (Meteorologists use the term “wintry mix” to essentially avoid getting too specific.) According to this story in the New Yorker, wintry mix most often happens in the central or eastern United States, thanks to a lovely concoction of cold air from Canada, warm air from the Gulf of Mexico, stormy air from the Rocky Mountains, and western air coming in on a jet stream. These all create a setting perfect for crazy frozen things to form and fall to Earth.

Lastly, we have hail, which only falls during thunderstorms and is actually most common in warmer conditions during the spring, summer, and fall. Hail starts as soft, snow-like particles that form in the below-freezing air at the top of thunderstorms (because it’s still cold up there, even in the summertime). As these particles fall into the storm, ice crystals and cloud droplets freeze onto them, and they stay suspended in the clouds for a while, gathering up more frozen stuff. When the pellets get too heavy, or when the winds that push them up into the clouds get too weak to keep them afloat, they start falling to the ground. 

Hail is usually only the size of a penny, but the largest recorded hailstone fell in 1986 over the Gopalganj district of Pakistan and was… 2.25 pounds. Imagine the terror when that fell out of the sky. Stay safe out there!

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What's the Difference Between Broccolini, Broccoli Rabe, and Chinese Broccoli?

I know, I know. There are few newsletter topics as sexy as cruciferous vegetables—especially the brethren of the classic eat-your-vegetables vegetable, broccoli. But just how when you grow up, you realize that vegetables are actually, well, pretty good, turns out that vegetables—or at least the differences between ones like Chinese broccoli, broccolini, and broccoli rabe—are actually pretty interesting, too. 

Let’s start with Chinese broccoli, also known as gai-lan, kai-lan, or Chinese kale. Chinese broccoli is a member of the species Brassica oleracea, the same species as regular broccoli, cabbage, and cauliflower; however, its “cultivar group” is called alboglabra, which sounds completely made up and/or like something out of Harry Potter. It has thick stems, itty-bitty florets, and large, flat leaves, and its flavor is somehow stronger and more broccoli-esque than regular broccoli.

Broccolini is actually a HYBRID vegetable, a cross between broccoli and Chinese broccoli that was invented in 1993. It was first grown under the name “Asparation” (??) because of its asparagus-flavor undertones, but then some genius was like “that is a truly horrible name for a vegetable” and decided to market it as “broccolini” in the United States instead. Broccolini/Asparation has a long, leggy stem, small florets, and small, if any, leaves, and is more tender and sweeter than either of its parents. 

Lastly, we have broccoli rabe, also known as rapini, which is not a broccoli derivative at all and is instead more closely related to the turnip. It’s a bitter green, similar to a mustard green, with thin stalks, little buds, and lots and lots of leaves. It’s particularly popular in Italian cooking, where its often sautéed in garlic and/or used in pasta dishes. 

Come March or April, you may start seeing “overwintered broccoli rabe” at the farmers’ market, which is broccoli rabe that was planted in the fall and then harvested in the early spring. This broccoli rabe is not as large and leafy as normal-wintered broccoli rabe, but the leaves and stalks are more tender and less bitter; the vegetable has to produce extra sugar in order to not freeze. And given the weather this past week, you can bet that whatever has survived come spring will be pretty damn tasty.

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What's the Difference Between an Orchestra, Symphony, and Philharmonic?

If you’re like me, feeling cultured feels good. There are few sensations as pleasant as learning something new, or exploring a different place, or doing something that expands your world even a miniscule amount. Also: being able to talk about feeling cultured feels good. Part of the fun of doing culture-y stuff is telling people about it, whether it’s excitedly or earnestly or just to show people how very cultured you are.

You know what doesn’t feel good? Trying show people that you’re cultured, and being WRONG. Nope, I think that’s a feeling we’d all like to avoid. And with that, let’s learn the real difference between an orchestra, symphony, and philharmonic.

An orchestra is a large group of musicians that usually includes the four major sections of Western instruments: strings, brass, winds, and percussion.

A symphony is a large-scale piece of music that typically contains three to four movements.

A symphony orchestra is an orchestra that’s big enough and has enough of a variety of instruments (usually 18 to 25!) to play a symphony. When an orchestra is called a “symphony,” it’s just shorthand for “symphony orchestra.”For example, when people call the CSO the “Cleveland Symphony,” they’re dropping the “orchestra” at the end—but it’s there. So: you are not going to see the “symphony,” you’re going to see the “symphony orchestra.” 

A philharmonic—or, really, a philharmonic orchestra—is the same thing as a symphony orchestra. The label is used to differentiate between two music groups in a city, so that you don’t get the Vienna Symphony Orchestra and the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra confused. But the term “philharmonic orchestra,” unlike “symphony orchestra,” is always part of a proper name—so I’d say I was in a symphony orchestra in high school, not in a philharmonic orchestra. (Unless I was actually in like, the New York Philharmonic in high school, which I was not.)

And with that, may I suggest Dvorak’s Symphony No. 9 and Beethoven’s Symphony No. 7 (particularly the second movement)? Because we can now resume talking about how cultured we are.

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What's the Difference Between Four-Wheel Drive and All-Wheel Drive?

It’s winter, people, which means fuzzy socks and hot chocolate and snuggling on your couch to watch not one, but TWO documentaries about the Fyre Festival. It also means single degrees and snowstorms and slippery roads—and, for those of us who drive on a regular basis, it’s a time to be extra-careful. It behooves us, then, to learn the difference between four-wheel and all-wheel drive—because despite the fact that the four wheels might be all the wheels, they are not the same thing. 

Let’s ease into it. In two-wheel drive, or 2WD, torque is applied to either the front or rear wheels, depending on the type of vehicle. This is more suitable for driving in mild climates, where a car doesn’t have much need for real traction. 

But both four-wheel drive (4WD) and all-wheel drive (AWD), as their names suggest, power all four of the vehicle’s wheels. So how do they differ? In all-wheel drive, the car sends a variable amount of torque to each wheel, depending on which wheels need it the most in any given moment. Four-wheel drive sends a fixed amount of torque to each wheel, which makes it much better for off-roading—but not as great for regular driving. That’s why most four-wheel drive vehicles have a two-wheel drive mode, and the driver can switch back and forth depending on the conditions.

It makes sense, then, that four-wheel drive is only found in SUVs and trucks that have higher ground clearance; these are the sorts of vehicles that you see fearlessly lumbering through the mud in football-game commercials. All-wheel drive, on the other hand, can be found in all types of cars and trucks, not just the off-roaders.

No matter what-wheel drive you have, stay safe out there!

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What's the Difference Between Russian and Thousand Island Dressing?

If you’ve frequented a salad bar recently—or returned from a quick jaunt from, say, the 1950s—you may recall a bowl or two of pink, florescent dressing with some chopped-up stuff in it. Maybe you dolloped some of it onto your plate of greens, or had a white-tocqued chef at the meat-carving station slather it on a sandwich for you. In any case: Was it Russian dressing or Thousand Island? If it wasn’t slapped in a bottle with a label, would you be able to tell the difference? Let’s find out.
 
Russian dressing is made with a mayonnaise-ketchup base, often livened up with pickle relish, Worcestershire sauce, prepared horseradish, and lemon juice and seasoned with paprika, onion powder, and/or mustard powder. It’s spicier and less sweet than Thousand Island, with a more complex, nuanced je ne sais quoi. Some say it got the “Russian” in its name because it once contained caviar: according to a 1957 New York Times article, an early version of the dressing in Larousse Gastronomique called for mayonnaise, tinted pink with the poached coral and pulverized shell of a lobster, seasoned with black caviar and salt. In any case, the creator of the dressing, a man named James E. Colburn of Nashua, New Hampshire (not Russia), sold so much of it that he acquired “a wealth on which he was able to retire.” Jealous.
 
Thousand Island dressing also has a mayonnaise-ketchup (or chili sauce) base; includes pickle relish and/or other chopped vegetables, such as pimientos, olives, and onions; and has some more rogue, recipe-dependent ingredients thrown into the mix, like parsley, chives, or hot sauce. The big differentiator, however, is the addition of a chopped up hard-boiled egg, which acts as a thickener and binds the ingredients together. The name comes from the region between northern New York state and southern Ontario, which is where it was invented in around 1900—most likely at one of the resorts up there that city folk frequented in the summer.
 
These days, you’re more likely to find the two dressings on sandwiches rather than salads—with Russian typically on a Reuben, and a Thousand Island–type spread used as the “secret sauce” on a Big Mac. But sadly, according to the Washington Post, “an examination of menus around the country shows that Russian dressing has all but disappeared from America’s national consciousness.” What’s more—and we just love this sort of thing at What’s the Difference HQ—what is actually Russian dressing might now be labeled as Thousand Island. “Sometimes it’s easier to just make things quickly understandable for the customer, to avoid wasting time explaining things,” Nick Zukin, co-author of The Artisan Jewish Deli at Home, told the Post. “Even if you made what was essentially a Russian dressing, you might call it Thousand Island just to avoid headaches."

🤯

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What's the Difference Between Lotion and Moisturizer?

It’s the new year, people, which means it’s time for green tea and grain bowls and Meditation and Self Care. It’s time to treat ourselves to feeling good; it’s time to mask our faces with indigenous soils and lather up our bodies like we’re in some sort of commercial and luxuriate in the warmth of our collective internal glow. But before we spend our first week’s paycheck on the season’s buzziest new product, or raid the drugstore aisle for another promised cure-all, we should probably know—what exactly are we rubbing all over ourselves, anyways? It’s time to learn the difference between lotion and moisturizer. 

First, let’s talk about moisture. It’s easy to think of moisture as water; when something is moist, it’s kind of wet, right? But when it comes to skin, water is a horrible moisturizer; it evaporates too quickly to soak in.

Lotion has a higher water content than moisturizer, and therefore does its work on top of the skin to cause some sort of effect, like preventing sunburn. Lotions certainly can carry vitamins and minerals, but ones that have a topical use; they’re doing something on the surface on the skin, rather than penetrating it. 

Moisturizer, on the other hand, is a cream that’s designed to bring moisture or vitamins or minerals into the skin, not just on top of it. This means that many moisturizers have sealing agents, like mineral oils or petroleum jelly, to help lock in that moisture. Moisturizers are therefore thicker than lotions, and are more effective for treating dry skin—especially in the winter.

Another thing about water? The more water that a product has, the more likely it is to attract bacteria—which is where preservatives and fragrances come in. Because lotions are more water-based than moisturizers, they’re more likely to have extra added ingredients, and therefore are more prone to irritate your skin. So when you’re shopping, be aware—those cucumber/coconut/cantaloupe scents might seem great, but they have a purpose other than making you smell like a spa. 

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What's the Difference Between Spruce, Fir, and Pine Trees?

Merry Christmas! Chances are, if you’re celebrating the holiday, you have a tree hanging out indoors somewhere, festooned in lights and popcorn and ornaments and whatever else you feel like draping on its scented limbs. But what’s the difference between that specimen in your living room and the giant one in Rockefeller Center, or the ones you can see from your frosted window, whose needles whisper softly in the winter wind? Let’s get to know our holiday evergreens. 

Spruce, fir, and pine trees are part of the class pinopsida, and they’re all conifers: their leaves take the form of thin, narrow needles, and they shed cones in order to reproduce. (Cones are essentially fancy seeds.) 

Firs, at least in America, are the classic Christmas trees; tall and narrow in appearance, their branches grow in thickly and luxuriously, oftentimes obscuring the trunk from view. The needles attach individually to each branch, and are secured by a doodad that looks almost like a tiny suction cup. Those needles are sharply pointed and somewhat flexible; however, since they’re flat, you can’t really roll them between your fingers. Firs have a smooth bark, and their cones are somewhat enigmatic; they grow towards the tops of the trees, and they usually break apart before falling to the ground. If you do get your hands on one, it will be green, elliptical in shape, and probably oozing with sap.

Like firs, spruce trees have needles that are attached individually to each branch, though without that suction-cup situation. Their needles are stiffer than firs and have four sides to them, making them easily roll-able between your fingers. The scales of spruce cones will be narrow and feel flexible, and their bark is the roughest and scaliest of the notable evergreens.

Pine trees have a more-sparse branch distribution than their fir and spruce cousins, making them the least likely Christmas tree contender. And unlike firs and spruces, they have two, tree, or five needles coming out of the same spot on each branch, with needles that are softer and more pliant. Pine-tree bark is jagged and flaky, and while their cones start out green and flexible, they grow brown and woody as they mature.

In case you need some more tree trivia to whip out at the dinner table tonight, how’s this: What’s the deal with Christmas trees, anyway? People have actually been putting evergreen trees in their homes since long before the birth of Jesus Christ; they were thought to ward off witches, ghosts, and evil spirits. The trees held particular significance around the time of the winter solstice, when people celebrated the return of the sun; the evergreen-ness of the evergreens was reminiscent of life and growth. In the sixteenth century, it’s believed that Martin Luther himself was the first person to put candles on an indoor tree; on the way home from a sermon, he was struck by how the stars looked twinkling above the evergreens, and he wanted to bring that brilliance into his home. It took a while, however, for Americans to get into the spirit; in 1659, in fact, the court of Massachusetts actually made it illegal to do anything besides attend church on Christmas, and people were fined for having decorations. But after an influx of German and Irish immigrants in the late nineteenth century, Americans finally started to get into the whole decorated-tree tradition, and the modern Christmas era officially began. 

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What's the Difference Between Jealousy and Envy?

Emotions are complicated. And if you, like me, would rather spend your time baking a deranged amount of granola or meticulously color-coding your closet instead of actually facing them, I feel you. But part of being an adult is trying to make sense of the things we feel in a given day—and it helps when you can actually define them. So let’s start with the difference with jealousy and envy, shall we? 

To put it bluntly, we feel envy when we want something that someone else has that we don’t. As in: I’m envious of her flowing mane of hair, or her new high-powered job, or her angelic ability to play the trombone. On the other hand, we feel jealous when something we possess is being threatened by another person—or, in other words, when we worry that someone will take away something that we already have. You may feel jealous, for example, when your girlfriend is dancing with another guy; the emotion is a direct result of something you have (a relationship) being threatened by someone else. 

In short: envy is a reaction to lacking something, while jealousy is a reaction to the threat of losing something.

Although the two emotions are actually quite different, it’s easy to get them confused. First off, many people use them interchangeably; you may hear something like, “I’m jealous of his rock-hard abs,” when the correct term would actually be “envious.” Many times, however, jealousy and envy travel together; you may feel jealous when another guy is chatting up your girlfriend, and you may also be envious of some qualities that he has that you don’t.

But chances are, statistically, that guy doesn’t subscribe to What’s the Difference. So at least you have that going for you!

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What's the Difference Between a Bug and an Insect?

Welcome to What’s the Difference, the newsletter committed to bringing you a decisive hit of random, wholly unseasonal knowledge in spite of the thrum of season’s greetings and BOGO deals and shipping notifications overtaking your inbox. Because let’s face it: you probably thought insects and bugs were the same thing, right?? Spoiler: THEY’RE NOT. Read on, my little elves. 

In classic biology taxonomy, all insects belong to a class called Insecta: six-legged organisms with three-part bodies, jointed legs, two antennae, and compound eyes (visual organs made up of many visual units clustered together, all with their own corneas and lenses). Insecta falls within the phylum Arthropoda: cold-blooded creatures with an exoskeleton and no backbone. Your classic insects include bees, mosquitoes, butterflies, and ants—all of which fall into a variety of orders/families/genuses/species within the Insecta category.

One of those orders is called Hempitera, and it’s where the bugs live. Bugs are types of insects with certain defining characteristics: 1) They have a mouth shaped like a straw, called a stylet, that’s used to suck up juices from plants or blood from other insects or animals. 2) They have no teeth. 3) They have some weird stuff going on with their wings: their front wings are thickened and colored where they attach to the body and taper out towards the back end of the wing, and their hind wings are usually clear and tucked under the front wings. Some example of true bugs include beetles, stink bugs, and cicadas.

If you’re paying attention, you’ll notice that there’s been no mention of spiders, and that’s because…spiders aren’t insects! Spiders, ticks, mites, and scorpions all belong to a class called Arachnida, a separate class from Insecta within the Arthropoda phylum. Arachnids have eight legs instead of six, two-part bodies instead of three, and simple eyesinstead of compound eyes. They also have different dining rituals: to eat, they inject digestive fluids into their prey before sucking up the liquefied remains. 

So, in summary: All bugs are insects. All insects aren’t bugs. And arachnids are their own separate category, with table manners that I’m looking to for #inspiration this holiday season. Bon appétit!

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What's the Difference Between Sour Cream and Crème Fraîche?

Happy Hanukkah! We may have been taught that this holiday was about celebrating resistance, courage, victory over oppression, the miracle of the Maccabees’ everlasting oil... but who are we kidding? Hanukkah is about eating fried food and sour cream. Here’s the difference between our favorite cultured dairy products, to add some context to your celebration. 

Sour cream, which has a fat content of around 20%, is made by mixing cream with a lactic acid culture; the bacteria thickens and sours it. It may also contain stabilizers, like gelatin or rennin, which aid in the thickening. Sour cream is less expensive than crème fraîche, and since it contains less fat and more protein, it will curdle if you simmer or boil it—so it’s best to use cold or room temperature, or to stir into a hot dish once it’s off the heat.

Crème fraîche—clocking in at 30% fat—is traditionally made with just unpasteurized cream, which naturally contains the bacteria needed to thicken it. However, in the United States, our cream must be pasteurized—so crème fraîche is made by mixing cream with fermenting agents that contain the necessary bacteria. You can actually make your own crème fraîche at home: mix together heavy cream and buttermilk, and let it hang out at room temperature until it reaches its desired thickness (around 8–24 hours). As it sits, the bacteria in the milk converts the sugars (lactose) into lactic acid, which lowers the pH of the mixture and prevents the formation of any unwelcome microbes.

Crème fraîche is thicker, richer (see: fat content), and less tangy than sour cream, and since it won’t curdle if you boil it, it’s great to use in soups and sauces. Or just spoon it into your mouth, unadorned. It’s the holidays, after all.

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What's the Difference Between Jail and Prison?

You can’t spell "correctional facility" without "correct"—and while there’s a lot that’s wrong with the criminal-justice system in this country, we can at least get our terminology right. Exhibit A: jail versus prison. Both are correctional facilities that are used to incarcerate people charged with or convicted of a crime, but the similarities stop there. Let’s get into the differences.

A jail is a temporary, short-term detainment center where an individual waits for a trial and sentencing. It’s occupied by people who have just been arrested, who are waiting to post bail, or who are unable to post bail and are waiting for a trial. It also can be where people convicted of smaller crimes—usually misdemeanors—serve a shorter sentence, typically less than one year. Jails are run by local law enforcement or local agencies, and are typically smaller than prisons in both size and infrastructure.

Prisons are where inmates go after getting sentenced for longer-term imprisonment, usually for more serious crimes. They're operated by either the state government or the Federal Bureau of Prisons; people who have been convicted of breaking a state law are sent to state prisons, and people who have been convicted of breaking a federal law are sent to federal prisons. Both prison types are much larger operations than jails; they house many more inmates and are generally set up with more infrastructure and resources suited to longer-term detention. 

On a related note: it’s Giving Tuesday, and if this subject is of interest to you, I’d encourage you to check out the organization Esperanza, which works with families to help young people who are court-involved get back on track towards a positive future. And if you missed Meek Mill’s story in The New York Times yesterday, give it a read, along with this profile of Larry Krasner, the Philadelphia district attorney, from The New York Times Magazine. 

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What's the Difference Between Hash Browns and Home Fries?

Remember that whole kingdom/phylum/class/order taxonomy you learned in ninth-grade biology? If you applied that very scientific framework to something like, say, fried potatoes, breakfast potatoes would be a genus, and home friesand hash browns would be the major species. 

Let's start with hash browns. According to Merriam Webster, hash browns consist of “boiled potatoes that have been diced or shredded, mixed with chopped onions and shortening, and fried usually until they form a browned cake.” For the sake of real-world application, we’ll expand this definition: hash browns are made from potatoes that have usually been par-cooked in some way, whether it’s boiling, steaming, or microwaving; mixed with any additional ingredients to form a homogenous mixture; and fried in some sort of fat into a crisp, golden cake/patty/structure/squashed-looking thing with frazzled edges. It can be shaped or shapeless, medusa-like or tidy, but the key is its shredded-but-still-held-together-ness. 

Home fries, on the other hand, are simply “potatoes that have usually been parboiled, sliced, and then fried.” What’s key about home fries is that the pieces of potato—whether they’re sliced into half-moons or diced into cubes—are distinct from one another. Those potatoes are usually fried in a shallow pan or skillet—as opposed to a deep fryer—and are sometimes cooked with sliced onions and/or peppers. 

In summary: home fries consist of pieces of potato, while hash browns are a coherent mass of shredded potato. With home fries, any mix-ins (onions, peppers, etc.) would retain their individuality, whereas in hash browns, the mix-ins would be incorporated into the shredded-potato mix. 

While we’re here, let’s explore some fun fried-potato facts, shall we?

• Waffle House serves 238 hash brown orders a minute.

• According to the book Menu Mystique, the first recipe for rosti—the shredded-potato cake thought to be the predecessor to hash browns—was found in Switzerland in 1598.

• French fries first appeared in America in 1802, when Thomas Jefferson, the president at the time, had the White House chef serve “potatoes in the French style” (namely “potatoes deep-fried while raw, in small cuttings”) at a state dinner.

• When McDonalds introduced their hash browns to the breakfast menu in 1977, their advertising read: “Hash Browns: A great taste in a funny shape.” Crazy to think that the shape of McDonalds hash browns—that flat, perfect, potato-shaped oval—was novel at the time.

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What's the Difference Between Pottery and Ceramics?

Chances are, you used some sort of pottery/ceramic product today: the mug you drank your coffee out of, the plate you ate your lunch on, the artisanal, hand-made pot you warmed your artisanal, stone-ground oats in, etc. But do you ever stare at the mountain of dishes in your sink and ask yourself, Gee, would those be classified as pottery or ceramics?No? Well, you’re about to learn the difference anyways.  

Technically speaking, ceramics are things made from non-metal materials that are permanently changed when they’re heated. The classic example is clay: even a dried clay product will disintegrate in water, but once it’s heated to between 350°C and 800°C (or above), it can get as wet as you want it. Glazes, which are actually a type of glass, are also ceramic; the firing process makes them stiffer than glass that’s poured or blown, allowing them to stick to clay surfaces. Other ceramic materials include the stuff that’s used in industrial or “advanced” ceramics, like silica carbide and zirconium oxide; these are the materials that things like spaceships are made of, and they're able to withstand the super-hot temperatures generated upon re-entering the earth’s atmosphere. 

Pottery is a type of ceramic, specifically containers made out of clay. (So an art piece made out of clay would not be pottery—it’d just be ceramics.) There are three major categories of pottery: earthenware, stoneware, and porcelain. 

Earthenware is made of clay that’s fired at relatively low temperatures (1,000°C to 1,150°C). The resulting product is porous and coarse, which then gets glazed and fired a second time. 

Stoneware is made of clay that’s fired at a high temperature (1,200°C) until it’s the consistency of glass, a process called vitrification. Because stoneware is non-porous, any glaze applied to it is purely decorative. 

Porcelain is a very hard, translucent white ceramic. To make it, small amounts of glass, granite, and feldspar minerals are ground up with fine, white clay and then mixed with water until the mixture is malleable. The resulting products get fired between 1,200°C and 1,450°C; decorated with glaze; and then fired again. This is also known as fine china. Bone china, which is stronger than porcelain, is made by mixing feldspar minerals, fine silica sand, and ash from cattle bones into that fine, white clay, and then is shaped and fired in the same manner. 

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What's the Difference Between Alligators and Crocodiles?

If humans were around 230 million years ago, and they had computers and email addresses and newsletters devoted to random facts delivered to their inboxes each week, they’d be asking this same question—because alligators and crocodiles, part of the Crocodilia order of reptiles, have been around for that long. That means that they’ve been here since before the dinosaurs, before the ice age, and before everything that came after that. 

And yet: we’re here, in 2018, and we still don’t know the difference. That’s about to change. Let’s get into it! 

Habitat: Crocodiles have a special gland in their tongues that can expel a large amount of salt, so they usually reside in saltwater habitats (such as mangroves and estuaries). Alligators don’t have this gland, so you’ll usually find them in freshwater.

Jaws: Alligators have wide, U-shaped snouts; crocodiles have pointier, V-shaped snouts.

Teeth: When a crocodile’s mouth is closed, the fourth tooth on the lower jaw sticks out above the top lip—but when an alligator does the same, all of its teeth are covered. Also: alligators’ upper jaws are wider than their lower jaws, which means that if they gave you a smile, you’d only see the top row of teeth. Crocodiles, on the other hand, have a toothier grin; their jaws are about the same size as each other, and when their mouths are shut, their teeth interlock. 

Skin: Both alligators and crocodiles have small, pit-like marks in their skin called integumentary sense organs, which act as motion detectors and allow them to feel for prey in muddy water. These organs, which look like small dots, are only on the alligator’s jaw—but they cover the entirety of a crocodile’s body.

Limbs: As discovered this year by researchers in Japan, alligators tend to have shorter humerus bones in their arms (or forelimbs) and shorter femurs in their legs (or hind limbs). This gives them a different gait than crocodiles; smaller crocodiles have been seen to bound and gallop on land, while alligators move in a more crawl-like manner. 

We could leave it at that, but in my extensive Crocodilian research, I found some of their similarities to be even more intriguing than their differences. Read on, if you dare:

• Crocodilians go through up to 8,000 teeth in their lifetime, and they can chomp through pretty much anything: a crocodilian bite can produce up to 5,000 pounds of pressure per square inch, as compared to the 100 pounds that a human jaw can generate. 

• Because both alligators and crocodiles are carnivores, they have particularly powerful senses. This translates into super-sharp vision, especially at night—their vertical pupils let in more light than our round pupils—and impeccable hearing; they can even hear their young calling out from inside their eggshells. Also, they have taste buds.

• Crocodilians can swim up to 20 miles an hour; they can run up to 11 miles per hour; they can hold their breath for over an hour; and they can survive for months in between meals.

• Crocodilians don’t chew their food; instead, they’ll swallow it whole, or if it’s too large, they’ll tear it up into large pieces. What’s more, they have to juggle their prey around so that it’s positioned in such a way that when they toss it back, it slides down their throat. 

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What's the Difference Between Cremini, Button, and Portobello Mushrooms?

Let me guess—you almost clicked out of this email. I obviously know the difference, you said to yourself. They are literally different types of mushrooms.

I am about to rock your world: THEY ARE NOT. THEY ARE LITERALLY THE SAME TYPE OF MUSHROOM. 

They are all Agaricus bisporus, in fact, just different ages: button mushrooms, which are white, are the toddlers; cremini mushrooms, which are brown, are the teenagers; and portobellos, which are brown and much larger versions of their younger selves, are the adults. (You know how creminis are sometimes labeled as “baby bellas?” They’re literally baby ‘bellos!)

Some more fun Agaricus bisporus facts:

• They account for 90% of the mushroom production in the United States, making it an almost one-billion-dollar industry.

• As the mushrooms mature, they lose some of their water content, making portobellos the most flavorful of the bunch (followed by the creminis, then the buttons). 

• The average American consumes more than 2 pounds of mushrooms each year. 

• Mushrooms are more closely related in DNA to humans than to plants.

• A single portobello mushroom can contain more potassium than a banana. 

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What's the Difference Between Tights, Pantyhose, Stockings, and Leggings?

You feel that clean, crisp chill in the air? ‘Tis the season for chunky sweaters, for pumpkin spice lattes, and for shoving your pale, bumpy legs into tight-fitting armor and strutting back into the world with newfound confidence. As a short person with calves too large to fit into normal-width boots, I like to pretend my legs don’t exist, and there’s no better enabler than cold weather. Here are the differences between the various leg-sheaths on the market. 

Let’s start with pantyhose. Thought of as hosiery, pantyhose are the thinnest of the bunch; they are sheer and generally made of nylon, with a denier (a measure of thickness or weight in tights) of 8 to 30. You’ll usually find them footed, so that they fit over one’s feet and stretch up to one’s waistline.

Tights are generally thicker than pantyhose, with a denier of 40 to 100; they can range from almost-see-through to totally opaque. Unlike pantyhose, they can come in a range of fabrics, patterns, and styles, though they are usually footed and worn under some item of skirt- or dress-type clothing. “Tights” is also the term for the stretchy leg-wear worn by dancers and acrobats, sported under a leotard or tutu or any other type of costume. 

Stockings, in some cases, can be synonymous with tights; they’re another footed, tight-fitting garment that comes in a range of fabrics, styles, and weights. However, the term can also refer garments that stretch only to the upper thigh (rather than the waistline) and then secured with suspenders and a garter belt. And unlike tights or pantyhose, one might find “stockings”—like compression stockings—in the medical sphere, where the word is used to describe tight bandages or coverings for the legs used in certain types of treatments.

Lastly, we have leggings, the one item of clothing on this list opaque enough to be worn freely in place of actual pants (the Oxford English Dictionary even defines them as “tight-fitting trousers made of a stretch fabric,” in case you’re like me and take your fashion advice from historical dictionaries). Leggings are un-footed—they stretch from the ankle or lower calf to the waistline—and can be found in a variety of fabrics, colors, patterns, and styles. And unlike the yoga pant—leggings’ looser, bell-bottomed cousin—leggings are tight-fitting, making them wonderful for both athletic use and, to put it bluntly, the days you don’t feel like wearing pants. Happy autumn!

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