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Why would garlic in a salad dressing turn bright blue?

I made a salad dressing with olive oil, apple cider vinegar, garlic cloves chopped into halves, fresh ginger, mixed herbs and mustard powder. When the dressing was finished I put a lidded jar of it in the fridge, and two days later topped it up again with fresh ingredients.

The following day the garlic from the original batch had turned bright blue. Why?

Ellice Bourke, Katherine, Northern Territory, Australia

Editorial status: In magazine.

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Categories: Domestic Science.

Tags: Food, blue, garlic, saladdressing.

 

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Freeganisto says:

 

This also happened to me.

 

In my Freegan foragings I found a large quantity of reasonably fresh garlic.

Having no refrigerator or freezer at the time I decided to pickle the blanched and peeled cloves to preserve them for later use.

They turned a number of shades of blue, from turquoise to purple.

I attributed this to a chemical reaction between the acetic acid (vinegar) and organic compounds in the garlic behaving in a manner similar to an indicator (of acidity - like litmus).

 

I didn't bother to identify the compounds.

The garlic's new colour made it unappetising so I had to re-disposed of it.

 

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Tags: Food, blue, garlic, saladdressing, pHindicator, pickle, vinegar.

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posted on 2010-03-18 12:42:08 | Report abuse

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Freeganisto says:

 

Subsequent to my previous response I discovered at

http://everything2.com/title/Garlic+oil

that the reaction that produces the blue colouration may produce toxins making me wonder if the blue colour is prussian blue or a derivative.

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Tags: Food, blue, garlic, saladdressing, pHindicator, pickle, vinegar, prussianblue, hydrocyanicacid.

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posted on 2010-04-04 13:18:34 | Report abuse


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its4kay@aol.com says:

 

  It is a well recognised phenomenon that pickling raw garlic cloves in an acidic solution will produce a blue colour. When garlic is damaged, the main odourless compound, alliin is converted by the enzyme alliinase to form allicin , a thiosulphinate which gives garlic its smell and taste. The  blue colour is caused by a further reaction between the thiosulphinate compounds and naturally occurring amino acids in the garlic itself, forming a range of blue pigments. Kay Bagon Radlett HERTS
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Tags: blue, garlic, saladdressing, bluegarlic.

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posted on 2010-03-18 18:25:05 | Report abuse


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