-Do people prefer the taste of artificial flavorings to natural flavorings or vice-versa?
-How much artificial food coloring is present in common sodas, snack foods, cereals, candies, etc.
And this one is sort-of nutrition, but more biology:
-Which type of lettuce contains more bacteria: Hand washed or pre-bagged?
I might not be a science teacher, but I did a lot of research science in college and continue to do investigations.
I think that the first part of the artificial flavorings would be a great experiment to set up. Food chemistry was one of my favorite food science classes. They did a lot of blind taste testing.
A suggestion would be to have the patrons tasting to taste in a room that is dark with only one bulb that is red or blue. That way, they can’t see what the real substance looks like.
If you were to do that one, you could also use all the info from the second question as a "useful information" piece for people to understand the relevance of your experiment.
I love the lettuce question as well. That’s so microbiology.
I hope you plan on pursuing research in college, you have some fantastic things going for you there!
PS: NC State has an awesome food science program and a well respected microbiology department…
) Good Luck!