Blue raspberry: the bizarre blue that’s been streaking tongues since childhood. Whether you love it or despise it (let’s be honest – who doesn’t enjoy a Blue Raspberry ICEE), blue raspberry flavor has found its place among candy companies and children’s hearts.
It has not, however, found its place among the produce department at your local Whole Foods. It’s a mystery that’s been silently plaguing your taste buds for years – whether you realized it or not. What is blue raspberry, and where does it come from? Where do blueberries fit in this equation?
The history behind the synthetic coloring and its mysterious flavor proves complex. Spoiler alert: it involves synthetic dyes, popsicles, and a berry with an unpronounceable name!
Life Before the Blue
Around the 1950s, questions about the safety of an additive Red No. 2 circulated society. FD&C Red No. 2 (“FD&C” stands for the federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act of 1938) has a wine red color that was then-used to represent raspberry-flavored products.
No definite research was uncovered (for now, at least), and questions continued unanswered about the potentially-harmful food dye.
It truly began in the early 1970s with the ever-so-popular Fla-Vor-Ice ice pops, along with Otter Pops (yes, the sugary tubes of corn-syrup you stick in the freezer).
These addictive summer treats were pretty limited to cherry, strawberry, watermelon and raspberry flavors (all of which have the same red color, making it super hard for a consumer to tell each one apart).
So, these popsicle corporations used different shades of the red dye in order to help distinguish the flavors. All appeared well for the companies until the Food & Drug Administration (FDA) released research in 1976 that showed Red No. 2 was super harmful to consume.
Birth of the Blue ICEE
Let’s backtrack a little here. In 1970 (several years before the FDA proved Red No. 2 was dangerous), the first taste of the magical flavor appeared. The blue raspberry flavor ICEE popped up beside its sister – the classic cherry ICEE.
This blue cavity-crazed treat used the same ingredients a raspberry-flavored snack had, but with a different dye that produced that electric blue color we’ve come to adore. The dye, FD&C Blue No. 1, made things easier for the customer.
The Marriage of a Mysterious Fruit and Blue No. 1
Over time, companies began creating their own version of blue raspberry. To answer your question, yes, there is a fruit that exists behind the bright blue color. And no, it’s not exactly a raspberry, as the berry behind the blue has a tarter flavor and texture closely related to a blackberry.
This berry’s formal name is the Rubus leucodermis (yeah, I couldn’t pronounce it either) but is commonly referred to as the White Bark Raspberry. Essentially, it’s a shrub with prickly shoots.
Stay with me guys, as this is the crazy part – the actual berry on the plant is a reddish purple color at first, turning a deep bluish purple when ripe. White bark raspberries are NOT blue.
Thus, the blue raspberry color/favor combination was born. It holds the impressive power of dyeing mouths across America. The white bark raspberry just happened to be that lucky fruit paired along with the vivid blue dye we’ve grown to love.
Mystery solved.