UNDER SCANNER - Eateries spice up dishes with colour, feel the heat

In Crackdown, Food Safety Dept Fines Popular Restaurants, Biryani Chains

Yellow and orange tinted biryani, bright red tandoori chicken, green mint chutney the hues may tantalise taste buds, but they have started attracting penalty from the food safety department, which is cracking down on restaurants using synthetic colours in food.

Popular biryani chains in the city, in particular, have come under scrutiny . Last Wednesday , officials collected samples of chicken-65 and biryani from a restaurant at Shastri Nagar, Vadapalani, following complaints of synthetic colours being used. Three other leading hotels -on Mahatma Gandhi Road, Nungambakkam; Third Avenue, Anna Nagar; and T-block in the same locality ­ also came under fire recently and have been directed to cough up fines of up to `25,000.

Experts say the crackdown is significant as more people are eating out. And, when it comes to biryani and its accompaniments, they are spoilt for choice with such joints sprouting in every corner. According to the Food Safety and Standards Regulations, 2011, artificial food colours are permitted only for select items. The quantity of colour should be a milligram or less for a kilogram. “[But] our labs find up to 50mg of colour in prepared food,“ said R Kathiravan, designated officer, food safety department, Chennai. He said colours are allowed in certain preparations as these items are not consumed daily. “But we are seeing an increase in synthetic colours being used in all kinds of food,“ said Kathiravan.

Since 2015, the department has collected more than `7 lakh as fine and more than 41 owners of eateries were convicted for adding artificial colours. Most of the items that contained toxic colours were chicken-65, tandoori chicken, chilli chicken, biryani, gobi-65, green chutneys and a few gravies. The colours don't just make the food more appealing. “Some of the samples we collected were clearly stale. The colours mask the smell too,“ said Kathiravan.

TOI spoke to a restaurant owner in Nungambakkam who was pulled up in March by officials after they found chemicals in a sample of chicken-65. The restaurant has reverted to using colour. “It is the most popular item. When we stopped using colour, people returned the dish saying it was just plain chicken,“ he said.

Food Safety and Standards Authority of India permits only eight synthetic colours to be added to specific foods. However, studies have shown that if consumed on a prolonged basis, these could cause cancer, nervous disorders, toxicity or heart diseases as they stay in the body for more than a month.

Dietitian Mini Joseph said hotels should use natural colours like turmeric for yellow, saffron for orange and Kashmiri chilli and beetroot extracts for red. “But restaurants rarely use them as they are expensive. One drop of a chemical gives more colour than natural ingredients,“ she said.

Members of Tamil Nadu Ho tels Association (TNHA) say they have appealed to FSSAI to add more food items from the south in the list of items that can have syntheti colours.

“We have been asking to add items that have for years been identified by certain colours like chicken-65,“ said M Venkada Subbu, president of TNHA.