Quirky Cookery - Page 38 of 263 -

Margarine used to be pink! (Facts about Food Friday)

butter, facts about food, faf, faff, food facts, fun facts, waffles | May 3, 2013 | By Jessi

Here’s a fun “did you know?” and no, I’m not talking about the pink Parkay in the picture above!

Back in the 1870s and 1880s, in an attempt to restrict the sale of margarine even more than their taxes and labeling laws, they forced manufactures to add pink coloring to margarine. The idea was that the pink would make it unpalatable and less desirable, and therefore, discourage people from buying margarine instead of butter.

The color bans started in big dairy states like New York and New Jersey (no surprise, right?) and even created an entire underground market for bootleg colored margarine (yes, that was a real thing) and food coloring capsules so that consumers could need in the yellow color into their margarine to make it look more like butter again.

Between the color rules and the taxes, it cut margarine sales down immensely (to about 40% of their previous sales). Eventually the Supreme Court jumped in and overturned the laws, but as many as 80% of Americans didn’t have access to yellow margarine (oh noes!).

Fast forward a little more than a century and Parkay actually intentionally released the colored Fun Squeeze versions of margarine above in hopes of making it MORE desirable and fun, so that people would be more likely to buy it. Everything cycles back around eventually, huh?

~Edit~ Oh, and I don’t think Fun Squeeze is still sold in stores, but you can get it on Ebay! http://www.ebay.com/itm/PARKAY-FUN-SQUEEZE-SHOCKING-PINK-MARGARINE-BOTTLE-/190155035809

Christmas in May? – NYC Bûche de Noël Train

chocolate, christmas, holidays, play with your food | May 2, 2013 | By Jessi

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Buche de noel train made up of fancy yule logs for Chrismas from NYC bakeries such as Balthazar, Benoit, Bouchon, Canelle Patisserie, Daniel Boulud (DBGB), Dominique Ansel Bakery, Epicerie Boulud, and Francois Payard Patisserie

(Thank you, Mr. Copy and Paste, for allowing me to correctly put “Bûche de Noël” in the title instead of Buche de Noel.)

I wouldn’t have even known to call it that, to be honest. I recognize the term “yule log,” but when looking at this train, that’s not what I would’ve immediately thought either. Ah well. The point is….

LOOK AT IT!

No, really look. Click through to the link, Serious Eats, and really look at each of the train piece breakdowns. Pretty incredible, right? Each one is from a fancy schmancy bakery in New York City that become highly sought after right around Christmas for their amazing yule logs. After seeing some of the pictures of the insides, I certainly can’t blame them, but I can’t imagine paying some of those prices either.

(With Google Reader going the way of the dinosaurs, I’m forced to find a new feed reader, and so far, I haven’t found one that will allow me to export/import all of my tagged/labeled items. That’s how I’ve saved a lot of my links over the last few years and I don’t want to lose them all. Unfortunately, that also means you’re going to end up with some holiday-specific posts during times of the year where they might seem a little out of place. Oops!)