Posts tagged as:

artificial colors

Halloween treats don’t have to be tricky

October 11, 2011

When you blog about kids and food, people ask you questions. Especially this time of year, when sweets flow like lava and the sugar high carries you from trick-or-treats to Easter baskets. What do you do about the candy? So here it is. The post about the candy. Our Halloween night strategy is pretty simple. [...]

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Farm camp, 19th century style

August 30, 2011

Tess just spent a week playing a 19th century farm girl. She’s done camps at this living-history museum every summer since she was 4. (You haven’t seen cute until you’ve seen 4-year-olds dressed like Laura Ingalls.) But the previous camps were a little of this, a little of that, a sampler of life in the 1800s. Now that she’s [...]

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Orthorexia vs. chocolate milk:
Will the real eating disorder please stand up?

June 1, 2011

Have you heard of an eating disorder called orthorexia? Translated literally, it means “correct appetite” or “correct eating,” and it’s when people obsess over the “right” foods to the point that it controls their lives and wrecks their health. Orthorexia isn’t new, nor is it recognized as an official disorder. But it’s gotten a lot [...]

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A dye-free future? We decide.

April 22, 2011

In the weeks since the FDA passed the buck on artificial food dyes, there’s been a lot of talk about the studies. Studies that elicit dismissive words like “inconclusive” and “inconsistent.” Or my favorite: “urban legends.” The FDA’s advisory panel, while weighing warning labels for foods containing fake dyes, did acknowledge ill effects in some kids with behavioral problems, and called for more research. [...]

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Eggs and chocolates and dyes, oh my

April 19, 2011

Pretty in pastels. Prettier in pinot? When I wrote about natural egg dyes last spring, I’d just started blogging and I felt compelled to go on a bit about the dangers of artificial food colors. A year later, my position on petrochemical dyes is, um, well-documented. So now I’ll just focus on the fun stuff. [...]

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No fooling:
Girl Scouts are green and the FDA is making us blue

April 1, 2011

I really shouldn’t post on April Fools’ Day, since the interwebs go a little nuts today. But it’s been a colorful week, so I’m ignoring the date and carrying on. Which brings me to the news that the FDA, after two days of hearings, has decided to do exactly nothing about artificial colors in our [...]

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Food-dye news every skeptic should read

March 27, 2011

Regular Spoonfed readers know that artificial colors infuriate me like no other food additive. They’re useless except to mask overprocessing and missing nutrients. They’ve been linked time and again to both behavioral and health issues. Food manufacturers use them solely to trick and manipulate. There’s not one legitimate reason to allow them in our food supply. So I hope [...]

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Reclaiming of the green (and tell the FDA “no dyes”)

March 21, 2011

In a different mood, I might appreciate the irony of such a blatant food-dye holiday falling two weeks before the FDA is set to examine the connection between artificial food colors and children’s behavior. A holiday where people don’t just buy synthetically altered food, but deliberately tint it bright green themselves (a nifty American spin that no doubt [...]

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It’s not just a cookie

February 19, 2011

When I wrote a post last month questioning Girl Scout cookies, I didn’t know what to expect. People get touchy about American icons.  Or they get afflicted with “it’s just a cookie” syndrome. But I plowed in anyway. No pain, no gain and all that. And wow. Talk about hitting a nerve. But in a good way. A really good [...]

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Stop reading labels and start reading ingredients

January 29, 2011

All week I’ve been seeing stories about Walmart-style food reform and food manufacturers’ self-serving nutrition labels, about fake meat, fake blueberries and fake maple syrup. Stories about all the ways the food industry tricks us, and all the ways people get mad about the food industry tricking us.  So here’s a thought: Let’s stop playing the game. Ignore the labels. Don’t look at numbers. Don’t believe [...]

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