Food Dyes

Earlier today I watched an interesting clip on Good Morning America about how a food's color affects perception of taste. In the video, children and adults are given the same flavor of jello and chocolate pudding, but it's been dyed several different colors. Both the tots and grown-ups assume each color is a different flavor.

Most food is artificially colored in some way and at the end of the segment they point out that showing the natural color of certain junk foods, like Cheetos, might get more people to stop eating them. Cheetos are naturally gray and they're given a bright orange artificial color. Would you eat them, and other junk foods, in their natural state? How do you feel about artificially colored foods?

Source: Flickr User jeffeaton

It's eggtacular! With all of the talk about food dyes and their effects on young tots this week, mamas preparing for Easter may be thinking twice about how they'll color their eggs this year. Using plant, fruit, and vegetable extracts, rather than the Red 40 and Blue Lake dyes at the forefront of the controversy, the Eco-Eggs Easter Egg Coloring Kit ($16) still creates vibrantly dyed eggs without harming your tots or the environment. The kit comes with three pots of natural dyes that can be used to create six colors, as well as cutouts that can be used to transform the eggs into bugs, animals, and more. Best of all, when lil ones splatter the dyes on the table and floor, they can be easily wiped up in a snap.