The Neon Fruit Illusion : A Fresh Recipe for Colour Science Demonstrations

Journal of Food Science

2022

While there has long been public concern over the use of artificial/synthetic food colors, it should be remembered that food and drink products (e.g., red wine) have been purposefully colored for millennia. This narrative historical review highlights a number of reasons that food and drink have been colored, including to capture the shopper's visual attention through to signaling the likely taste/flavor. Over the course of the last century, there has, on occasion, also been interest in the playful, or sometimes even deliberately discombobulating, use of food coloring by modernist chefs and others. The coloring (or absence of color) of food and drink can, though, sometimes also take on more of a symbolic meaning, and, in a few cases, specific food colors may acquire a signature, or branded (i.e., semantic) association. That said, with food color being associated with so many different potential “meanings,” it is an open question as to which meaning the consumer will associate with any given instance of color in food, and what role context may play in their decision. Laboratory‐based sensory science research may not necessarily successfully capture the full range of meanings that may be associated with food color in the mind of the consumer. Nevertheless, it seems likely that food color will continue to play an important role in dictating consumer behavior in the years to come, even though the visual appearance of food is increasingly being mediated via technological means, including virtual and augmented reality.

Section: On the Future Manipulation Of Food Colormentioning

confidence: 99%

“…99The recently discovered “neon fruit” illusion provides another intriguing technological means of modifying the appearance of fruits by alternating between two different metameric lighting distributions (see Harvey et al., 2019). …”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

On the manipulation, and meaning(s), of color in food: A historical perspective

Journal of Food Science

2022

“…So, for instance, people tend to match the smell of strawberry to a pinkish colour whereas the ripe fruit are themselves typically a much richer red colour [30]. Increasingly, it is now also becoming possible to modify the colour of food dynamically using food chemistry or clever lighting manipulations (see [147], for a review), as illustrated by the recently-discovered neon fruit illusion [45]. What is more, the effects very often appear to be indistinguishable in terms of their magnitude and automaticity from when the colour happens to be in the flavourful stimulus itself [137,158].…”

Section: Environmental Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality Coloursmentioning

confidence: 99%

Exploring the Links between Colours and Tastes/Flavours

Levitan

2022

jpi

The colour and other visual appearance properties of food and drink constitute a key factor determining consumer acceptance and choice behaviour. Not only do consumers associate specific colours with particular tastes and flavours, but adding or changing the colour of food and drink can also dramatically affect taste/flavour perception. Surprisingly, even the colour of cups, cutlery, plates, packages, and the colour of the environment itself, have also been shown to influence multisensory flavour perception. The taste/flavour associations that we hold with colour are context-dependent, and are often based on statistical learning (though emotional mediation may also play a role). However, to date, neither the computational principles constraining these ubiquitous crossmodal effects nor the neural mechanisms underpinning the various crossmodal associations (or correspondences) that have been documented between colours and tastes/flavours have yet been established. It is currently unclear to what extent such colour-taste/flavour correspondences ought to be explained in terms of semantic congruency (i.e., statistical learning), and/or emotional mediation. Bayesian causal inference has become an increasingly important tool in helping researchers to understand (and predict) the multisensory interactions between the spatial senses of vision, audition, and touch. However, a network modelling approach may be of value moving forward. As made clear by this review, there are substantial challenges, both theoretical and practical, that will need to be overcome by those wanting to apply computational approaches both to understanding the integration of the chemical senses in the case of multisensory flavour perception, and to understanding the influence of colour thereon.

“…Within the field of dining, the term 'food magic' seems restricted to chemical reactions like changes in PH, as in colour-changing cocktails that use pea flower [52]. However, looking to the future, it may be possible to use a range of different techniques to elicit transformation, such as a change in colour, thus leaving the diner/drinker uncertain as to the explanation for the transformation that they have just experienced: Is it a chemical transformation, a psychological/perceptual illusion, or some form of mentalism [51,53]? This style of magic trick was followed-up very successfully by 'Think-a-Drink Hoffman', who can be seen performing his routine on B&W TV show on the following YouTube clip [43].…”

Section: Cocktail Magicmentioning

confidence: 99%

Magic on the Menu: Where Are All the Magical Food and Beverage Experiences?

Youssef²,

Kuhn

2020

Foods

Magic and dining have long been popular forms of entertainment. What is more, both involve some kind of transformation, and yet while the more theatrical aspects of dining have grown in popularity in recent decades, there is a surprising paucity of magical food and beverage experiences out there. In this article, we trace the historical appearance of food and drink and culinary items in the performance of magic. We also review some of the more magical elements of food design that have appeared on menus in bars and restaurants in recent years. We introduce the edible lightbulb dish from the menu at Kitchen Theory Chef’s Table and link it to the stage magic of Derren Brown. We also discuss some of the reasons as to why magical food experiences might be rare in the context of dining. In so doing, our hope is to highlight an intriguing area for future research and innovation. Along the way, we identify some possible candidate approaches for the introduction of edible magic onto the menu in the context of modernist cuisine.