Bakeman Food Coloring Green

Food colouring, or colour additive, is any dye, pigment, or substance that imparts colour when added to food or drink. They come in many forms: liquids, powders, gels, and pastes. Food colouring is used in both commercial food production and domestic cooking. Food colourants are also used in various non-food applications, including cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, home craft projects, and medical devices.

The addition of colourants to foods is thought to have occurred in Egyptian cities as early as 1500 BC when candy makers added natural extracts and wine to improve the products’ appearance.[6] During the Middle Ages, the economy in the European countries was based on agriculture, and the peasants were accustomed to producing their food locally or trading within the village communities. Under feudalism, aesthetic aspects were not considered, at least not by the vast majority of the generally impoverished population.[7] This situation changed with urbanization at the beginning of the Modern Age, when trade emerged—especially importing precious spices and colours. One of the first food laws, created in Augsburg, Germany, in 1531, concerned spices or colourants and required burning saffron counterfeiters.

Thus, with potted meat, fish and sauces taken at breakfast, he would consume more or less Armenian bole, red lead, or even bisulphuret of mercury [vermillion, HgS]. At dinner with his curry or cayenne, he would run the chance of a second dose of lead or mercury; with pickles, bottled fruit and vegetables, he would be nearly sure to have copper administrated to him; and while he partook of bon-bons at dessert, there was no telling of the number of poisonous pigments he might consume. Again, his tea, if mixed or green, he would certainly not escape without the administration of a little Prussian blue…[12]

Many colour additives had never been tested for toxicity or other adverse effects. Historical records show that injuries, even deaths, resulted from tainted colourants. In 1851, about 200 people were poisoned in England, 17 fatally, due to eating adulterated lozenges.[7] In 1856, mauveine, the first synthetic colour, was developed by Sir William Henry Perkin and by the turn of the century, unmonitored colour additives had spread through Europe and the United States in all sorts of popular foods, including ketchup, mustard, jellies, and wine.[13][14] Originally, these were dubbed ‘coal-tar’ colours because the starting materials were obtained from bituminous coal.[15][5]

Synthetic dyes are often less costly and technically superior to natural dyes.