Colors and More...
So we were flipping through Longo’s most recent issue of their Experience Magazine – education & ideas for adventures in food. Indeed, it was quite an adventure for busy students like us, who are not usually all that into figuring out recipes and cooking in the midst of exams and assignments. However, in about two minutes of time, we’ve learned many interesting facts simply from flipping through the pages. We learned that, being more than Mother Nature’s fat-free sweetener, maple syrup is an excellent source of manganese, riboflavin and zinc, and also contains magnesium, calcium and potassium. Research has shown that maple syrup has an antioxidant capacity which is comparable to a banana or a serving of broccoli. The magazine further discusses the importance of family meals to the overall well-being of children and parents. On the next page, it talks about how music is key to setting the mood and an essential part of the ritual of eating. Already impressed by the depth of the nutritional and social content of each article, we saw Longo’s cooking experience class: Bento Nouveau Makimono Sushi lessons all over the GTA. At this point, we have completely fallen in love with this magazine and all the foods/recipes introduced in them.
What strikes us the most is the magazine’s unbelievably appealing combinations of colours for all of their recipes and images of foods. Then it hit us, perhaps we are visual people and maybe many people are. It wasn’t the knowledge or experience offered by this magazine, but rather the cheerful colors that drew us into reading. We took a moment to think about how essential colors are to foods & why that is and dug up a little more about it on the internet. Blue is an appetite suppressant that’s usually incorporated into weight loss plans (Color Matters, 2008). Scientific explanations offered are that blue food is a rare occurrence in nature. There are no leafy blue vegetables, fruits and meats, aside from blueberries. Blue doesn’t exist in any significant quantity as a natural food color (Color Matters, 2008). Consequently, we don’t have an automatic appetite response to blue (Color Matters, 2008). Furthermore, our earliest ancestors associated blue, purple and black with poisonous foods when they went out foraging (Color Matters, 2008). Green, brown, and red are the most popular food colors. Red, therefore, is often used in restaurant decorating schemes because it is an appetite stimulant (Color Matters, 2008). Now what does it mean to know about colors and food? Taking a step further, we can think of how the food industry makes use of such knowledge and manipulates the visual effect and color factor in almost every modifiable food product in hopes of influencing our purchasing behaviour.
What comes to your mind?
Juices, pop and soda? Yes, for sure. They are dyed in deliciously looking colors also known as food additives. Not so delicious anymore? Are there coloring agents in pre-packaged fruits and vegetables to keep it attractive and enhance its keeping quality? Yes. And it’s not just about having additives. The food industry has long planted the seed of Genetically Modified Food into our soil so that crops yield more & larger and are more visually appealing than what nature originally designed them to be.
What can we do as consumers?
We as nutrition students and responsible consumers can purchase organic foods or foods grown in an environmental-friendly manner without the use of pesticides, antibiotics, or genetically altered organisms. (Please see a fuller discussion on the pros and cons of purchasing organic foods in another entry on our blog) Purchasing locally to support small local farmers/producers can be another way of discouraging the incentive to maximize profit from bigger producers elsewhere. We should be more aware of the tools available to us in nutrition labelling and always watch for labels of unwanted and unnecessary additives in the everyday product that we consume.
What about the structure that regulates our food market?
Having learned about how policies and structures intricately influence what and how information is made available to consumers from our FNN400 class, we ask ourselves what should be done from higher up to protect nature’s products and our right to enjoy the original, unmodified foods? Is it possible to subsidize local, organic farmers/producers and tax foods/products that use coloring agents and other harmful additives? How can we encourage people to purchase the somwhat more expensive organic products when the food market is so competitive? How by removing food additives from our food products, is this going to affect the long-term health of the Canadians? More studies need to be conducted so these questions can be answered thoroughly. We hope that most people would agree with us that we’d rather eat what foods actually are as naturally presented (without all that visual and physical modification), as opposed to what we think they are (in their complete makeovers)!
References
Morton, J. L. (2008). The Effect of Color on the Body. Retrieved Feburary 15, 2010, from Color Matters: http://www.colormatters.com/appmatters.html
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