4 Food Colors with Plant Based Ingredients

While I was developing the recipe for my Rainbow Tortilla Chips, I knew I wanted a natural alternative to store-bought food coloring, because I've always used them in desserts, and I've always disliked how much quantity I've needed to put to actually get a bright and vibrant color as opposed to the easily achievable pastel colors. And probably it's because of the brand I use, but most of those store-bought colors fade quite a lot after baking. So I started my quest for natural food colorings, and I found that very few people actually use natural coloring, despite the fact that all the colors are actually quite easy to achieve! The best thing is that I found brilliant chefs who incorporated these ingredients in colorful pasta. That might be my next project! Anyway, without more ado, let's get to the colors.




1. Red/Pink
Red is probaly the most common color we have in food. We all know the easy answers for desserts: strawberries and raspberries. But when it comes to savory the answer may not be so obvious: beetroot is definitely the most bright red colored veggie. And there's a few options to get the various shades of red and pink and everything in between with beetroot.



a) The quickest way is to get canned beetroot, drain the juice and save it to use as is to get a pastel pink (especially in frostings and milkshakes). If you need to color something pink quickly, this is the way to go.

b) To get a more concentrated color, simply blend the canned beetroot (or home boiled) with a little bit of water (or the juice from the can) until you get a thick smoothie texture. Strain to get it silky and lump-less. This is what I used for my Rainbow Tortilla Chips recipe.

c) This last option may not be available for all, but it's quite good for coloring pastas and other recipes that don't require much liquid: powdered beetroot. Powdered beetroot is becoming more and more popular as a natural make-up ingredient due to it's high pigmentation, it's a great dry coloring ingredient, I really recommend it if you can find it.

2. Green
Green is another very easily achieved color that can be found in veggies everywhere. You can basically use any dark-leaf veggie and  juice it to get a vibrant liquid green to color just about anything. Let's look at my favorite options:

a) Spinach. I love spinach, I always have it in my smoothies, and I love the fact that it's so widely available unlike kale (which is quite rare where I live). Take a bunch of cooked spinach leaves, add them in a blender with a little bit of water and blend until you get a thick paste. Strain this mixture to squeeze out the maximum liquid pigment.

b) Matcha powder. Spinach may be ideal for savory recipes, but for desserts matcha has to be the winner. Use high-quality matcha for the most vibrant greens, lower-quality matcha tends to have a brownish hue that doesn't look very appetizing.

3. Yellow

For me, there is only one ingredient I rely on to get beautiful yellow colors in my recipes: turmeric. Turmeric has so many health benefits and it has such a deep yellow color, plus it can be used both in savory and sweet recipes. Turmeric milk was what my mum gave me when I had a sore throat ever since I was a kid, as a teen I'd make an anti-acne turmeric face mask that would leave a yellow stain on my hairline (at least it did help with acne!), and those are just a couple of uses that have been existing for generations; I see it's becoming a trend right now, so it's great that turmeric is more known now. Just mind how much you put in your recipes, because it has a very strong earthy taste that with a little goes a long way.

4. Purple/Blue
Blue is basically one of the rarest colors we can find in the food world. I just recently discovered these two ingredients to get both blue and purple:

a) Red cabbage. Who would have thought the humble red cabbage would provide me the blue food coloring I craved? In fact, red cabbage can actually give us three colors: purple, blue and pink (thanks to pH). To make basic purple coloring, roughly chop the red cabbage, put it in a pot and fill with water until the cabbage is covered. Cook on low heat until the cabbage is soft, drain out the cabbage (can be used in soups and stews). You'll get a purple colored liquid that you can reduce to get a more concentrated mixture on low heat, letting it boil constantly. To make it blue, you'll need to add an alkaline ingredient, such as baking soda. Add 1/4 tsp of baking soda at a time until you get your desired shade of blue (I'd avoid putting too much baking soda as it adds an unpleasant aftertaste). To get a crimson pink, simply add an acidic ingredient, such as lemon juice.

b) Butterfly Pea Flower tea. This tea has become viral lately, because it has color-changing properties just like red cabbage, but you can actually drink it as is. I haven't been able to find Butterfly Pea flowers or tea in my area, but it is all the rage on the internet. Simply steep your tea or flowers in boiling water, let it sit 5 min, drain out the tea/flowers and use the same way as red cabbage coloring to change the color. Layered Butterfly Pea Flower tea lemonade is all the rage right now on the internet.

A little word of caution: most of these colorings may not do very well in non-white bases, that's why most cake recipes call for store-bought food coloring, I am not against the use of this type of food coloring. I just think exploring other options can be very enlightening and useful for some types of recipes where conventional food coloring may not perform as well as their natural counterparts, this would be the case for pasta.