The colours of food

So, I was eating my breakfast the other day, sort of just gazing down into the deep dark depths of my...  oatmeal clumps? and got sort of transfixed by the colour the oats had taken on because of the addition of raspberries.

Raspberry cheesecake oats : 1/2 cup rolled oats + 1 thinly sliced banana + 1 handful frozen raspberries + 1 cup almond milk + 1/4 cup water- into a saucepan to bubble away until liquid is absorbed. Greek yoghurt stirred in at the end

It made me think about other foods, their colours and as a result my obsession with them.

As I can only assume with most other people, the more colourful and vibrant and down right out-of-the-ordinary coloured a food is, makes it all the more appealing to me. (Well played Star Burst, well played.)

Of course, you already know that I'm also drawn to all things natural and wholesome, so when a totally natural whole food is naturally a randomly bright and eye-catching colour... I'm sold!

Can you imagine if spaghetti was really like this!

I wanted to find out a little more about the colours of foods and as a result our perceptions of said food. I was intrigued guys!

What I came across was even more justification of the awesome-ness that is nature.
We've all heard before that eating a varied and colourful diet is great for our health. Why? Because nature cleverly created different nutrients to impart different colours into the foods they're in. For instance, the anthocyanins that turn blueberries blue can also keep your mind sharp (hence the brain food reputation)

I also found some stuff out about how colours can affect the way in which we eat a food.  For instance, as shown in the pic above, blue is considered an appetite suppressant and as a result along with using blue plates and having a blue light in your fridge, some diets even go as far as to suggest dying your foods blue!!

Looking at this picture, I kind of get it!

 This is all nature's doing once again as blue is such a rare colour in nature and therefore we don't have an automatic appetite response to blue. Wacko!

And white? Causing over-eating/ snacking. For some reason white makes us forget the food contains any calories at all? Mind boggling!

It's a hard concept for me to grasp- that simply seeing foods can cause all sorts of reactions in your body, firing up the neurons in your brain that control appetite and causing your glands to lose all sense of control and salivate over a glorious edible visual in front of you!

At the end of the day, I concluded that it was just something I had to accept.. and experiment with. Expect some different colours appearing on the blog in the future. Purely scientific, right?

Fun!

Toss some cooked spaghetti noodles with diluted blue food coloring or cook the noodles in blue colored boiling water. (Note: Use only "food coloring" purchased in a grocery stores for these recipes. Other coloring agents are toxic.) Imagine what you can do to the sauce. Don't forget to add a few blue M&Ms for garnish.

^I also have to try this. ASAP! ^

What about you?

Do you ever think about the craziness that is the colour of our foods?

Favourite colour in food? I would say... res/purple. I mean; berries, grapes, water melon, apples etc!

Ever dyed your food a random colour for fun?

Ahhh oatmeal... you really do initiate the weirdest thought processes in me!

Also, chocolate oatmeal, I still love you, even if you're brown colour is considered unappetising :)

Any-who, that's enough thinking for one day (I think exams are really starting to melt away my logical brain)! I hope you all have a fabulous day and eat something awesome (taste/colour wise)! Bye for now!! :D