Wednesday, March 26, 2008

5. ore

ORE is a volume of rock that potentially contains valuable mineral deposits.

Iron ore, lead ore, and gold ore are all examples of ores. Once ore is mined, various physical and chemical methods are used to remove the commodity from its source. Material can be pulverized and sifted to give mining operations a smaller amount of material to analyze for value. The unique physical and chemical properties of the materials that comprise ore allow for techniques that take advantage of characteristics like magnetism and gravity differentiation to successfully extract metals and minerals.

Ore is part of the brand name of Ore-Ida, a labeled owned by Heinz. Ore-Ida produces frozen potato products, such as French fries and Tater Tots. Tater Tots celebrated their fiftieth anniversary in 2004. Tater Tots were invented in 1953 (and released to the public in 1954) by Golden and Nephi Grigg, the Oregon brothers who founded the company. They were looking for a way to make use of the shredded potato that remained after French fry production. Tater Tots are prominently featured in the quirky independent comedy Napoleon Dynamite and in songs by the parody artist Weird Al Yankovic.

According to their Web site, Ore-Ida uses Russet Burbank, some Shepody, and some Ranger potatoes in most of their products.

No telling whether sifting, gravitational differentiation, or magnetism are employed in Tater Tot production.

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