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Blue Food
By Linda | May 4, 2008
George Carlin had a comedy bit about blue food.
“Why is there no blue food? I can’t find blue food — I can’t find the flavor of blue! I mean, green is lime; yellow is lemon; orange is orange; red is cherry; what’s blue? There’s no blue! Oh, they say, “Blueberries!” Uh-uh; blue on the vine, purple on the plate. There’s no blue food! Where is the blue food? We want the blue food!”
Towards the end of the novel ”2001: A Space Odyssey”, Arthur C. Clarke describes the food that the aliens have engineered for astronaut Dave Bowman; a nutritionally complete, pleasant tasting nondescript substance. Packaged in familiar ceral boxes and cans, the contents of all the containers was the weight and texture of bread pudding and blue in color.
If the aliens in 2001 had done their research, they would have picked any color other than blue for their “human chow”.
The reason? Humans are hard wired to avoid eating things that are colored hues that do not naturally occur in edible substances. Blue food is a rare occurrence in nature. There are no leafy blue vegetables (blue lettuce?), no blue meats (blueburger, well-done please), and aside from blueberries and a few blue-purple potatoes from remote spots on the globe, blue just doesn’t exist in any significant quantity as a natural food color.
Studies have found that the color of a food can greatly affect how its taste is perceived. Brightly colored foods frequently seem to taste better than bland-looking foods, even when the flavor compounds are identical. Foods that somehow look off-color often seem to have off tastes. For thousands of years human beings have relied on visual cues to help determine what is edible. The color of fruit suggests whether it is ripe, the color of meat whether it is rancid.
During an experiment conducted in the 1970s, people were served an oddly tinted meal of steak and french fries that appeared normal beneath colored lights. Everyone thought the meal tasted fine until the lighting was changed. Once it became apparent that the steak was actually blue and the fries were green, some of the test subjects became physically ill.
Want to have some fun? - Only with the supervision of an adult, of course!
Cook up a batch of spaghetti noodles in boiling salted water to which you have added several drops of blue food coloring. Drain and serve as you normally would. See what observations you and your family have about the flavor of your blue meal.
Vision isn’t the only sense that can alter your perception of the flavor of foods. To learn more, CLICK HERE.
Topics: Health & the Human Body, Nature, Projects & Experiments |
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May 4th, 2008 at 5:17 pm
[…] Darlene wrote an interesting post today onHere’s a quick excerpt“Why is there no blue food? I can’t find blue food — I can’t find the flavor of blue! I mean, green is lime; yellow is lemon; orange is orange; red is cherry; what’s blue? There’s no blue! Oh, they say, “Blueberries! … […]