Black Food

Submission 10,310

About

Black Food refers to edible items that arrive at a dark ebony color after being prepared using a variety of ingredients, including charcoal, food dye and cephalopod ink. Online, photographs of black-colored food are often circulated as a novelty on social media platforms.

Origin

One of the classic black-colored foods is the Valencian Arròs negre,^[7] a seafood and rice dish which uses cuttlefish or squid ink for its signature dark color (shown below).

Spread

On October 31st, 2007, the news site OnlineAthens^[8] published an article reporting that ebony-colored foods had gained popularity in Japan and other Asian countries.

Black Burger King Burger

In September 2014, Burger King began selling a black Whopper burger colored with bamboo charcoal (shown below).

In September, 2015, Burger King released the similar A.1. Halloween Whopper nationwide in America (shown below). The Whopper was distinctive because of the black shade of its bun and the use of A..1 Steak Sauce instead of the traditional Burger King Special Sauce. The United States version would not contain charcoal, but instead the flavoring of the steak sauce and “less than 1% food dye.”

Black Ice Cream

Black ice cream may have originated with the black sesame ice cream in Japan, which often contains black sesame paste, milk, vanilla seeds, sugar and salt. On June 6th, 2012, Redditor oxsouls submitted a photograph of black soft serve ice cream to the /r/pics^[2] subreddit, where it gained over 1,700 votes (93% upvoted) and 490 comments prior to being archived (shown below).

On February 26th, 2015, Redditor Octopusmouth posted a photograph of Japanese black sesame ice cream to /r/pics,^[6] where it received more than 5,900 votes (86% upvoted) and 790 comments before it was archived (shown below, left). On May 6th, 2016, Instagram^[1] user daryabulykina posted a photograph of a scoop of black ice cream in a black waffle cone (shown below, right). That day, the photo was reposted by the timandtimicecream Instagram feed.

That month, the Manhattan-based ice cream shop Morgenstern's Finest Ice Cream began selling black ice cream. On May 25th, the entertainment news blog People published an article titled "Jet Black Ice Cream is Officially a Thing We Need to Eat." On June 6th, Tech Times^[5] published an article titled "Black Ice Cream is the Latest Summer Treat Trend." On June 20th, the PopSugar Food YouTube channel posted an instructional video on making black ice cream at home (shown below). In July, the news sites UpRoxx^[3] and Foodbeast^[4] published articles about the trending novelty ice cream.

Black Croissant

On May 6th, 2016, Instagram user @yennyeeee^[11] uploaded a photograph of a black croissant dyed with squid ink at the Agathé Pâtisserie bakery in South Melbourne, Australia (shown below). The photograph was subsequently highlighted in an article about ebony-colored cuisine published by The Daily Mail.^[10]

Black Hot Dog

In July 2016, IKEA Japan^[9] began selling a "Ninja Dog" hot dog, which contained a black-colored bun made out of edible bamboo charcoal (shown below).