There are obstacles to teaching science; however, these obstacles are not insurmountable. One obstacle is the students themselves. Students often labor under the misconception or anxiety that the course material will be too difficult to understand, or boring (mind-numbing), or that the information learned will not be applicable in their day-to-day lives. Herein lies the challenge for the educator; how can laboratory experiments be designed that are educational, interesting, and accessible for introductory biology or nonmajors students? The authors' goal was to design a bench experiment tailored to the environment of advanced high school biology, college freshman biology, and nonmajor labs. This essay focuses on the development of an assay to isolate apicomplexan cysts. The authors believe as an outcome of using this assay, teachers will be able to use the isolation of "Toxoplasma" and related apicomplexan tissue cysts as a means to teach food safety, and to introduce some basic concepts about infectious disease and cell biology. Additionally, this laboratory exercise is an outstanding way to initiate a discussion about the 26-year AIDS epidemic and its profound effects (life ending), especially in developing countries. (Contains 3 figures.)