The topic of this post stems from a sister willing for me to research into food colourings and the potential harms it had. I have personally been using mainstream food colourings for a while now – unaware of the nasties that I may find in the product.
Being from Australia, I naturally have advice for products that can be purchased locally here. As a child, I have thoroughly enjoyed baking in the kitchen, recreating sweet snacks which I was unable to purchase because of them being haram.
For this post, I have looked into the Queen Brand food colourings which you can find in any Woolworths, Coles or IGA supermarket in Australia as these are the most popular and common to almost all of Australians here.
Verdict: Haram or Halal?
Some are “halal” and others are “haram”.
The “Pink Natural Colour”, “Yellow Natural Colour”, “Cochineal Food Colouring” and “Red Colour Extract” (not “Pillar Box Red”) are haram for consumption. This is because these all contain high concentrations of alcohol. For the “Cochineal Food Colouring”, it does not only contain alcohol, but ‘Food Colour (120)’ which is created by crushing up insects. Be cautious for any food products that do contain this food colour in the future.
I have investigated the properties of the each of the Queen Brand food colouring numbers, and have found that fortunately for all you brothers and sisters they are halal.
Also doing the research into these products – I have found out that these products contain a lot of harmful chemicals, some of them being obtained from coal and are known to cause cancer.
Repeated number codes which coexist in these food colourings are:
- Chlorophyll-copper complex (colour) – (141).
- Turmeric Root Extract Powder (100).
- Beetroot Juice Concentrated Powder (162).
- Food colour (124) – Ponceau 4R (colour).
- Preservative (220) – Sulphur dioxide.
- Preservative (211) – Sodium benzoate.
- Food acid (330) – Citric acid.
- Food colour (123) – Amaranth (colour).
- Food colour (102) – Tartrazine (colour).
- Food colour (133) – Brilliant blue FCF (colour).
- Food colour (122) – Azorubine or Carmoisine (colour).
The code we as Muslims should be cautious off from a halal perspective is:
- Food colour (120) – Carmines or Carminic acid or Cochineal (colour).
- This is because this cochineal food colour is made by the crushing of insects – and insects are not regarded as halal.
For a chart of preservatives/food colours – I recommend you all to refer to these two websites:
Colours 100-181
Food Additives
I hope that this at least provides an insightful and thorough post about food colourings and the essentials that are in food colouring.
We must know that these are artificial colours, and nothing can beat the original colour.
Halal For Noobs 