# Why are there no BLUE food **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [November 30, 1999, 1:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-there-no-blue-food/5079 "1999-11-30T01:23:00Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![system](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/original/2X/e/e489c3b7d8fce19c4b355dd4fc3f88cc39c34b87.png) [@system](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/system)\ **Post date:** [December 1, 1999, 2:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-there-no-blue-food/5079/21 "1999-12-01T14:13:00Z")
nano,all foods that are heated up are infrared! ---
**Author:** ![deus\_ex\_machina](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/a88e57/32.png) [@deus\_ex\_machina](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/deus_ex_machina)\ **Post date:** [December 1, 1999, 3:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-there-no-blue-food/5079/22 "1999-12-01T15:50:00Z")
Just because George Carlin made a good routine out of it doesn’t mean it isn’t an interesting question! With one exception, every “blue” food I’ve ever seen was either artificially colored or not very blue at all: Blueberries – blackish purple (juice does get pretty blue in contact with something basic, like baking soda; blue cheese – blue-greenish gray; blue corn chips – blue gray, tending towards purple. The one exception was [Borrage flowers](http://bzmaclachlan.tripod.com/borrage.jpg), used as a garnish on salad. Blue pigments seem to be rare in nature. IIRC, among traditional artists’ pigments the blues are both the most expensive and the least light-fast. I’d try to explain this as the result of the pigments absorbing lots of high-energy photons, but it seems to me that this should make RED pigments the most unstable… ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [December 1, 1999, 4:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-there-no-blue-food/5079/23 "1999-12-01T16:47:00Z")
> [@](#): > > With one exception, every “blue” food I’ve ever seen was either artificially colored or not very blue at all C’mon, blue is blue is blue. If you apply a sufficiently narrow definition , you might as well say there is no green food; celery is greenish white, spinach is greenish black, broccoli is greenish grey, etc. “Bluish” equals blue in my book; ergo, blueberries, blue corn, et al, are all blue foods. * * * TT “Believe those who seek the truth. Doubt those who find it.” --Andre Gide ---
**Author:** ![system](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/original/2X/e/e489c3b7d8fce19c4b355dd4fc3f88cc39c34b87.png) [@system](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/system)\ **Post date:** [December 2, 1999, 6:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-there-no-blue-food/5079/24 "1999-12-02T06:14:00Z")
Why there are not any good grammar? ---
**Author:** ![deus\_ex\_machina](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/a88e57/32.png) [@deus\_ex\_machina](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/deus_ex_machina)\ **Post date:** [December 1, 1999, 10:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-there-no-blue-food/5079/25 "1999-12-01T22:04:00Z")
I’m tempted to just respond that “blue is blue is blue, but blue corn isn’t.” I guess all I can really say is that the foods mentioned do not fall within the range that fits my mental category “blue.” Actually, blueberries with the bloom (the powder, not the flower) still on do count as blue with me, but cooked or in fruit salad or whatever, the bloom is off, and the pigment color, which to me is purple, is what shows. Anyway, the rarity of foods that are _unambiguously_ blue seems to me to be a reflection of the rarity of blue organic pigments. I’d say “why are there [so few] blue foods?” really is a legitmate chemistry question. ---
**Author:** ![Brightmoon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/b487fb/32.png) [@Brightmoon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Brightmoon)\ **Post date:** [December 2, 1999, 1:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-there-no-blue-food/5079/26 "1999-12-02T01:55:00Z")
what @ blue rasberry blowpops??? they are deffinately blue!!! eat one then look @ your tounge in a mirror. and also blue cotton candy. * * * Whatever!!! Just don’t screw up my life with your wicked stupid ideas! ---
**Author:** ![Gilligan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e0b2c6/32.png) [@Gilligan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gilligan)\ **Post date:** [December 2, 1999, 2:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-there-no-blue-food/5079/27 "1999-12-02T02:14:00Z")
In an episode of _Chef!_ Everton loses a band-aid in the kitchen, and Blackstock has him put on a blue one from the first aid kit, saying (yelling, actually) that blue ones are used because there are no blue foods. I know there are blue foods, but I’m wondering, do restaurants really use blue band-aids? ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [December 2, 1999, 4:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-there-no-blue-food/5079/28 "1999-12-02T04:00:00Z")
Excuse me **deus ex machina** , are we to accept that the only _unambiguosly blue_ foods are those that _fall within the range that fits (your) mental category blue_? That is the very definition of subjective judgement, and therefore not unambiguous. Please offer a more objective standard, such as an angstrom range in the visual spectrum; until then, **bluish is blue is blue food**. * * * TT “Believe those who seek the truth. Doubt those who find it.” --Andre Gide ---
**Author:** ![Markxxx](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5daacb/32.png) [@Markxxx](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Markxxx)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 1999, 4:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-there-no-blue-food/5079/29 "1999-12-03T04:46:00Z")
I can’t believe no one mentioned BOO Berry Cereal. Oh I wish they still made that. Also the real answer is that blue food did exist. It was the fruit that hung from the tree of life in the garden of Eden. When God put the sword there no one could get it. Thus today we die because we couldn’t eat from the tree of life. So as long as there is death there will be no blue food. ---
**Author:** ![ruadh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/d2c977/32.png) [@ruadh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ruadh)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 1999, 5:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-there-no-blue-food/5079/30 "1999-12-03T05:41:00Z")
This is probably a UL, but I remember hearing that the butter folks tried to pass a law when margarine was invented to require it (margarine) to be colored blue. ---
**Author:** ![deus\_ex\_machina](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/a88e57/32.png) [@deus\_ex\_machina](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/deus_ex_machina)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 1999, 3:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-there-no-blue-food/5079/31 "1999-12-03T15:56:00Z")
ThufferinThuccotash, I’m not trying to be contentious – color _naming_, as opposed to color _description_, seems to me to be inherently subjective. That’s what I meant by stating that **all** I could **really** say is that it doesn’t look blue to **me**. By “unambiguously blue” I mean that region of the color solid that all (non-color-blind) observers agree is described by the word “blue.” Quantitatively, I’d expect this to center on pigments that have a primary absorption peak in the 580-620 nm (orange) range. Add longer wavelength absorption, and you’ll get blue-greens, which I’d guess most observers would still call “blue.” Move toward the shorter wavelengths, say 550-580 nm, and I guess some people will say that the proper word is “violet” or “purple,” but others will still say “blue.” I’m not sure what the effects of changing brightness and saturation would be. So, for any chemists: Are organic pigments whose primary peak is around 580-620 nm inherently less stable than others? Or seem that blue is unusual because chlorophyll, hemoglobin, and the carotenes are so common? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-there-no-blue-food/5079.md?page=1)