The dye is cast.
Kraft Foods is removing artificial coloring from its macaroni and cheese and General Mills is doing the same for certain cereals.
Supposedly, it is to make the popular foods more nutritious.
But let’s wait until hundreds of thousands of moppets all across the land vote on this. What if they raise a rumpus and refuse to eat their favorite grub because it has changed color? The high-chair vote has yet to be tabulated.
Kraft is taking the biggest gamble. It reportedly sells 1 million boxes of mac and cheese a day. That is oodles of noodles.
But the company has caved in to self-appointed food police, a small army of blog-based parents who are convinced that said dyes cause everything in tots from asthma to an inability to learn to hyperactivity.
Never mind that the scientists at the Food and Drug Administration maintain that nothing is harmful with the product.
However, a petition drive was organized on a website run by a lady named Vani Hari, who calls herself Food Babe. She is no scientist, but earns a living organizing crusades on the Internet and selling copies of her book.
In forcing Kraft to bow down, she has been quick to stick a feather in her cap, but it might be too early to call it macaroni.
Kraft will replace the colorings next year and try to replace them with natural ingredients such as paprika.
But what if the mac’s color goes from a handsome orange to pink? Quick to act, one of Kraft’s competitors is already urging consumers to “look for the gold” in its macaroni.
Let’s not forget the epic battle between butter and oleomargarine.
Margarine, without artificial coloring, is white. Thus, years ago, when it was uncolored, hardly anyone ate it. At that time, butter was inexpensive and deemed healthy for the diet. Spreading uncolored oleo on bread seemed to be akin to applying lard.
But when World War II came along, butter was rationed and difficult to find. Butter was said to be critical to the war effort. The government maintained it was important in making munitions to blow the axis forces to smithereens, and who could argue?
Thus, consumers were stuck with white oleo and manufacturers were prohibited from adding artificial color to it by federal law supported by the dairy lobby.
But public outcry about pitifully pale oleo was so great that small packets of coloring were soon added to the oleo packages. Mixing the two was a time-consuming chore that exasperated many a mom.
After the war, people largely went back to buying butter. But in 1955, the ban on buying colored oleo was lifted and the popularity of the “alternate spread” took off and it became the No. 1 seller. Part of the switch was due to a “scientific study” that claimed butter was bad for the arteries. That has since been debunked.
Bottom line: Studies to support a cause can always be purchased. And never underestimate the importance of the color of food. Like it or not, it is also part of the “taste.”
Dick Hilker (dhilker529@ ) of Arvada is a retired suburban newspaper editor and columnist. He writes twice a month for The Denver Post.
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