How Artificial Dyes Color Our Taste in Food
Imagine you opened a can of tomato soup, and it wasâŠbrown.
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Transcript
Imagine you opened a can of tomato soup, and it wasâŠbrown.
Consumers expect tomato soup to be, well, the color of tomatoes.
Tastes like these drive the market for food products and affect every stage in the production process. Consumersâ expectations help determine foodâs packaging, appearance, and even additives, including flavoring and coloring. Food colors are used for a variety of reasons. The ones that typically come to mind to the average consumer are to color kind of colorless foods, make them a little bit more fun, make them a little bit more appealing to consumers, but also to identify flavors. These kinds of associations explain why we insist that our iconic tomato soup be red. There are nine certified food color additives that are approved for use in food, including the seven FD&C artificial colors approved under the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act. These colors tend to be more vibrant, they're less expensive, and they blend easily in a variety of applications. These colors are subjected to rigorous safety standards by the Food and Drug Administration in the U.S. But different regulations for food additives around the world can cause confusion. Consumers are becoming increasingly interested in the health impacts of artificial food dyes as well as other ingredients.
Synthetic food dyes have been used in the U.S. for decades. One of the things that I would stress is that artificial food colorings, as well as food additives, are in our foods for a reason. That reason can be nutritional value, that reason can be preservation, that reason can be anti-spoilage or antimicrobial, but they are in the foods for a reason. Kraft did something sneaky in 2015: they quietly removed Yellow No. 5 and No. 6 from their mac and cheese. They replaced the artificial colors with paprika, annatto, and turmeric and waited for customers to react. And, well, they didnât. Fifty million blue boxes later, the company had received zero complaints, so they fessed up. They explained that they didnât want to sabotage their new recipe by announcing changes to such a beloved food. Scientists say this is the balance with food additives: to find the sweet spot in customersâ tastes and budgets and keep up with the changing concerns of each new generation.
Tastes like these drive the market for food products and affect every stage in the production process. Consumersâ expectations help determine foodâs packaging, appearance, and even additives, including flavoring and coloring. Food colors are used for a variety of reasons. The ones that typically come to mind to the average consumer are to color kind of colorless foods, make them a little bit more fun, make them a little bit more appealing to consumers, but also to identify flavors. These kinds of associations explain why we insist that our iconic tomato soup be red. There are nine certified food color additives that are approved for use in food, including the seven FD&C artificial colors approved under the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act. These colors tend to be more vibrant, they're less expensive, and they blend easily in a variety of applications. These colors are subjected to rigorous safety standards by the Food and Drug Administration in the U.S. But different regulations for food additives around the world can cause confusion. Consumers are becoming increasingly interested in the health impacts of artificial food dyes as well as other ingredients.
Synthetic food dyes have been used in the U.S. for decades. One of the things that I would stress is that artificial food colorings, as well as food additives, are in our foods for a reason. That reason can be nutritional value, that reason can be preservation, that reason can be anti-spoilage or antimicrobial, but they are in the foods for a reason. Kraft did something sneaky in 2015: they quietly removed Yellow No. 5 and No. 6 from their mac and cheese. They replaced the artificial colors with paprika, annatto, and turmeric and waited for customers to react. And, well, they didnât. Fifty million blue boxes later, the company had received zero complaints, so they fessed up. They explained that they didnât want to sabotage their new recipe by announcing changes to such a beloved food. Scientists say this is the balance with food additives: to find the sweet spot in customersâ tastes and budgets and keep up with the changing concerns of each new generation.