Natural dyes for dough

How tasty and appetizing the dish seems will depend on its appearance, including color. In order to make food more vivid and attractive to children and adults, housewives often use food dyes. They are available in most supermarkets, but not always helpful. To bake, dumplings or noodles look more elegant, but would not become harmful to health, it is desirable for them to use natural dyes for the dough. They are not able to give products the same rich color as synthetic pigments, but they are safe and can be made at home.

Cooking Features

The basis for the production of natural dyes for the dough are berries, fruits, vegetables, greens and some other products.

Red and pink colors can give to the dough beet juice, juice or mashed lingonberries, raspberries, cherries, strawberries, cornels. The hue will depend on the concentration of the dye.
To obtain a blue dye use black grapes, blueberries, blackberries, red cabbage, peel frozen eggplant.
To give the dough a yellow color, add yellow spices (saffron, turmeric), lemon zest, boiled egg yolk.
When it is necessary to tint a dish in orange color, persimmon, carrot juice, orange zest, pulp or apricot juice are added to it. Orange can also be obtained by mixing the dyes of red and yellow.
Dainty greens made from nettle, sorrel, spinach, dill or parsley will help to appetizing the green color of the dishes. Most often used for this spinach, as the most juicy of these products and has the most neutral taste. By combining the yellow and blue dyes, you can also give the dough a green color.
An unusual purple color can be added to baking by adding dyes of red and blue to the pastry.
Brown makes baking more seductive. The dye of the corresponding shade is obtained from burnt sugar or strong coffee. To give the dough a delicate golden-brown color, use a decoction of onion peel.

To obtain the desired effect, it is not enough to know how to color the dough in a particular color. It is important to imagine how the dyes are obtained from the products listed above and how to use them correctly for coloring the dough.

Greens to obtain a dye are ground to a state of mashed potatoes using a meat grinder or blender. From the resulting puree through squeezed in several layers of gauze squeeze juice.
Vegetables (beets, carrots) are ground on a grater, covered with a small amount of water and stewed for 3 minutes. To enhance the color, add a few drops of vinegar. After the right time, the vegetable puree is cooled and drained through cheesecloth.
Eggplant peel, citrus zest are finely chopped, then cooked just like beets or carrots. Heat treatment may require a longer, vinegar can not add.
To obtain dye from berries or fruit, they are ground to puree, poured with a small amount of water, heated to boiling, sometimes boiled for a few minutes, then filtered through the gauze.
Spices to obtain a dye enough to dilute a small amount of water. Sometimes they are added directly to the flour in undiluted form, but in this case it is important not to overdo it.
Natural dyes are not able to give baking a really bright shade. To make the cakes look brighter, some housewives do not add dyes directly to the dough, but they soak the cakes.
If it is necessary to tint dumplings, dumplings or noodles, other similar products, the dye is added to the liquid on which the dough is kneaded. The amount of the liquid itself should be reduced by the amount of liquid dye used.
Usually, to get a color test, add a tablespoon of natural dye to a glass of used flour. If you want to get a richer or, on the contrary, lighter shade of proportion, you need to change in the appropriate direction.

Having studied several recipes for preparing natural dyes for dough, you will master the basic principles of the technological process and will be able to make dyes from any products that can give the dough one or another color.

Blue Color Recipe

Composition:

blueberries - 50 g;
water - 25 ml.

Preparation Method:

Loop, wash the berries. Put them in the blender bowl.
Add boiled or filtered water.
Turn on the unit, turn the contents of its bowl into a puree.
Put the mashed potatoes in a small cup, put it in a microwave. Turn it on for 10-20 seconds. You can warm the composition on a slow fire or water bath.
Allow the berry puree to cool slightly. Transfer to the gauze folded in several layers, strain the mashed potatoes through it.

Natural dyes deteriorate quickly, so it is advisable to use them within 24 hours after preparation. Store blueberry dye in the refrigerator. In a similar way preparing the blue dye from blackberry, but it will have a slightly different shade.

Red dye recipe

Composition:

beets - 0, 2 kg;
water - 50 ml;
Table vinegar (9 percent) - 5 drops.

Preparation Method:

Wash and peel raw beets. Cut into pieces.
Grind it grated with small holes or using a blender.
Place the beetroot puree in a small saucepan or pan.
Measure out 50 ml of boiled water, add vinegar to it, mix.
Pour the grated beets with acidified water.
Bring to a boil over low heat and simmer for 3 minutes.
Cool the beetroot mass. Press through gauze or thin cloth folded in several layers.

In an analogous way, an orange dye is prepared from carrots. The red dye of the berries is the same as the blue dye of blueberries or blackberries.

Yellow dye recipe

Composition:

saffron leaves - 20 g;
vodka or boiling water - 40 ml.

Preparation Method:

Finely chop the saffron leaves with a knife, place them in a small volume glass container.
Fill with vodka or hot water. Leave for a day in a dark cool place.
Strain.

The yellow dye can be obtained from lemon peel, grinding it with a knife, pouring boiling water on it, boiling it for 2-3 minutes and squeezing. An even simpler recipe is to pour a little turmeric into a glass of warm water and stir until the liquid has the desired shade.

Green dye recipe

Composition:

spinach - 50 g;
water - how much will leave.

Preparation Method:

Grind Spinach with a blender or meat grinder.
Put the greens in a dipper, cover it with water so that it completely covers the green mass, put on a slow fire and extinguish for 30-40 minutes. Make sure that the water does not boil away, if necessary, pouring it.
Spinach squeeze through cheesecloth.

If you immediately squeeze out the juice from the minced spinach without subjecting the product to heat treatment, it will be low and this dye will be a little less resistant.

Any hostess can make natural dyes for dough. You just need to know what products are suitable for this and how to get a substance out of them that can dough in different colors.

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