This yellow is toxic | How To Cook That Ann Reardon

Which food colors cause hyperactivity? Cancer? Asthma? Allergies?
Hi I am Ann Reardon, How to Cook That is my YouTube channel, this week we are looking at if food colors are toxic, do they cause death? What's the deal with Red Food Color? Does food dye cause hyperactivity in children? Is red food colour safe? And why are various food colours banned in some countries? Join me for creative cakes, chocolate & desserts, new video every Friday.

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[maxallsop]

my normal process now is getting ready for bed and curling up with a nice, new ann video! great work as usual 🥳

[hexmaniacwingy]

I had a teacher in HS who had a poster on her wall that said "SNAKE VENOM IS ALL NATURAL TOO" and that's stuck with me whenever someone tries to use "it's natural!" to insist something is safe

[addie]

thank you for clearly showing how natural does not necessarily mean safe, I hate how this has become a massive marketing term

[adamsfusion]

7:30 A helpful bit of context here is that purple was still a very expensive dye to produce and sought after because of its expense and rarity, so he more or less stumbled on purple gold. If there was any color dye most beneficial to accidentally create, it was purple.

[dw_]

As an ADHDer, those claims that food dyes are "causing" ADHD have always bothered me. I'm very glad you covered it because people often misrepresent or sensationalize the research, which contributes to misunderstanding and spreads misinformation about the disorder.

[mattymerr]

The yellow in the burger is probably to make it look like a brioche with lots of butter or something

[Ellie-ufqc]

I was one of those ADHD kids who were tested to see if red food dye was the culprit. Because of this I can firmly say that ADHD is not caused by food coloring.

[AgemanXX]

THIS is what a "balanced take" looks like. Clear, unbiased, backed with data, and presented in an informative but still engaging way. One would be hard-pressed to find a single moment in this video where Ann is *telling* the viewers the answer the a question (rather than presenting the facts and letting you come to your own conclusions), and yet I still come away feeling more educated than I went in and that's great. Thanks for making such fantastic content all these years.

[KT-Kaboom]

Thank you for covering food dyes and neuroatypicality and how they're NOT linked! I'm both autistic and have ADHD, and I've had these since I was born. However, I ALSO had an allergy to a common blue food dye used commercially in the US in the 90s, and for YEARS it was assumed "the blue dye makes their symptoms worse! They're so squirmy and can't sit still!" It's because I was covered in itchy hives! Nobody ever thought to see if maybe something else was going on because "everybody knows food dye makes kids with ADHD get worse!"

[icarusbinns]

One of my high school classmates thought she was allergic to anything red. Turns out… she was actually allergic to those cochineal beetles! But since those are used in so many things, she opted to get allergy meds. Things like makeup can have the beetle color

[Caipininha]

as a foodchemist working in offical risk assessment it drives me crazy how much misconceptions there are among normal people because everyone can say bs on the internet and the more polarizing it is the more people will hop on the train. im so glad you are one of the few that takes a neutral professional take on this topic

[lazygardens]

You could do a whole series on "The Horrible History of Food Safety".

I have a couple of household hint books with sections for detecting adulteration in foods - a good housewife had to be a chemist. And found one that explained all the common tricks used by British food sellers and how to detect them.

[dlh]

"It's not as simple as that" Pretty much sums up the internet. People try to distill everything down into a meme - that's why it's important to get a fuller, balance explanation like Ann provides! Love her videos and approach.

[hypercane]

You continue to be one of the best science channels out there even as a cooking show. You don’t just say “that doesn’t work” you explain the science of it and show visual demonstrations to help better understand it.

[shackleshotgun]

Me who grew up on a farm with natural ingredients, nothing store brought, and still ended up with ADHD: must've been the food coloring. :(

[hmitchell]

I'm close with someone who's allergic to turmeric, a very popular yellow/orange food dye, just because something is natural does not mean that it's necessarily safe for everyone, awesome video!

[Morphwastaken]

I remember back in middle school I had a friend who “couldn’t have food dye” because her mom told her that food dye made her go crazy and the last time she ate food coloring she “ate her sisters blanket”. Her favorite snack she had every day was goldfish.

[cncinc]

I wonder if you'd consider doing a video about MSGs, and the whole debate surrounding whether its harmful or not? Might be interesting.

[JediDryad]

As one of those rare people with an allergy to artificial dye (at least when I was younger, it takes a lot more of it to cause a reaction now) knowing right away what it is is true! I didn't get asthma/anaphylaxis, but I did break out in hives pretty badly, it happened with one of the reds, but also Skittles on the whole - which we later learned was because ALL Skittles have (or at least had) that red in the chewy filling part.
Of course, trying to explain this to other kids (and some not-so-bright parents) just made them think I couldn't have ANY red food, including apples, tomatoes, cherries and strawberries.

[leftoverspagehhti]

I love how respectful you are about the stratagies they used 200 years ago. A lot of people would have said "Ew they used bugs in their food! Thats disgusting!" But instead, you explained how we still use that method today and how it makes a nice colour. People tend to act like everything from the past was disgusting and barbaric when we still do the same stuff today. Great vid, Ann!