Ingredient Information

Function

Yellow 5 Lake is a food coloring that is also known as Yellow No. 5, Yellow 5 and Tartazine. It is commonly used to obtain a color that matches the anticipated flavor of a food. Yellow 5 Lake is found in custards, beverages, ice creams, cereals, chips, marshmallows, packaged macaroni and cheese meals and in wheat noodles that try to mimic the look of Chinese egg noodles. Yellow 5 Lake is sometimes fed to chickens to make their yolks a brighter shade of yellow. Yellow 5 Lake is used as a primary color to achieve a yellow shade or mixed with blue to produce varieties of green.

Other Use and Industries

Yellow 5 Lake is used in some pet foods. It is found in shampoos, fabric dyes, soaps, lipsticks and coated tablets. Some artists use Yellow 5 Lake as a body paint.

Health Effects

Reports show that artificial dyes aggravate ADHD symptoms. The FDA has approved food dyes like Yellow 5 Lake, but these dyes do not appear naturally in nature so caution should be used when consuming them. 21 studies have shown that Lake dyes contribute to hyperactivity, restlessness and attention problems. Removing Yellow 5 Lake and other artificial dyes from the diet could result in children being able to reduce their ADHD medications. Yellow 5 Lake is present in many restaurant items that do not have to list all of the ingredients, so it is important to take care in researching potential ingredients on a menu.

Origins

Yellow 5 Lake is a dye that has been approved for use in foods. It is dissolvable in water but not oil. Colorants for food come in two varieties; dyes and lakes. Lake colors are produced by combining dye with salt to make an insoluble compound. Lakes are not oil soluble, but they are oil dispersible. Lakes are made from petrochemicals. They are sourced from the colorless runoff of crude oil. Lakes are mixed with nitrates and sulfuric acid.