[Sca-cooks] OT/OOP: Wazzup with "Red Velvet Cake"

[Carol Eskesen Smith]

Yes, AEllin, the artificial colors we use are coal tar derivatives, with a couple of minor exceptions, such as caramel color.  You probably can't make the "old" red velvet cake any more, since Red #2, Amaranth, was banned (back in the late '60's or early '70's), but there are replacements (usually a blend of FD&C Red #40 Allura Red and FD&C Blue #1 Brilliant Blue), which is not the same.  Red #2 was a purple-leaning red; Red #40 tends more toward orange.  Still, a quarter cup is a lot of color.  There's an industry standard "GMP" (good manufacturing practiced), which states that one uses the minimum amount necessary to achieve a desired effect, and it especially applies to artificial colors...
changing the color of one's pee or poop is WAY beyond good practice!

Regards,
Brekke (probably preaching to the choir)
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: AEllin Olafs dotter 
  To: Cooks within the SCA 
  Sent: Monday, May 10, 2004 4:33 PM
  Subject: Re: [Sca-cooks] OT/OOP: Wazzup with "Red Velvet Cake"


  I first heard of this in college, from a friend. She was local, from 
  Ohio, and this had been her favorite cake throughout childhood. Her Mom 
  made it with *4* bottles of red dye...

  And, my friend had developed an allergy to the substances used in food 
  coloring (coal tar, I want to say?), and anything else they were used 
  in. (Don't remember, at this date, what all she couldn't eat/use... 
  IIRC, the list was impressive.)  Which is the reason I remember her 
  talking about it... I was sure the cake was to blame, she was sure it 
  wasn't... and she said it just wasn't the same, didn't taste as good, 
  without the dye. Her mom would sometimes, for a treat for her, make it 
  with merely a single bottle, and she could eat a sliver of that, but it 
  wasn't as good...

  So - that brings it to Northern Ohio in the sixties and seventies... I 
  met her in '74. Long before the internet chain letters. Don't remember 
  her calling it Red Velvet, though I've heard that name since - just Red 
  Cake. I am happy to say that, the year they were kind enough to invite 
  me for Thanksgiving, they did *not* have it, or anything else I would 
  hesitate to eat...


  AEllin


  Phil Troy / G. Tacitus Adamantius wrote:

  > Also sprach Daniel Myers:
  > 
  >> For a long time the recipe for this cake was distributed only through 
  >> chain letters - on and off the internet.
  > 

  > 
  > My first glimpse of it on a website suggested that it was The Other Big 
  > Secret Recipe (after the Niemann-Marcus Cookie, of course) being 
  > distributed via chain letters.
  > 
  >


  >
  > 
  > As I say, it doesn't sound bad at all, but I'm a little alarmed at the 
  > amount of food coloring called for. I'm thinking of skeletons being dug 
  > up in the distant future, bright red. (Okay, I've had some bad 
  > experiences with green food coloring that was... shall we say... not 
  > metabolized properly...)
  > 
  > Adamantius
  > 
  >>
  > 

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