Poisonous Coloring Matter, etc.
The following poisonous coloring materials are sometimes used in confectionery, says “The Art of Confectionery,” but should be avoided: Scheele’s green, a deadly poison, composed of arsenic and copper; verdigris (green), or acetate of copper—another deadly poison; red oxide of lead; brown oxide of lead; massicot, or, yellow oxide of lead; oxide of copper, etc.; vermilion, or sulphuret of mercury; gamboge, chromic acid, and Naples yellow. “Litmus, also, should be avoided, as it is frequently incorporated with arsenic and the per-oxide of mercury.”
Ultramarine blue is barely admissible, and blue candies are less liable to be injurious than green, yellow, or red. Marigolds and saffron are sometimes used for coloring; but the cost of these, particularly the latter, compared with the minerals, as French and chrome yellows, is so high, rendering the temptation to substitute the latter so great, that purchasers should give themselves the benefit of the fear, and use no yellow candies of a cheap quality. Green candy is the most dangerous. Buy none, use none; they are mostly very dangerous confections.
Licorice, Gum Drops, etc.
About the nastiest of all candies are the licorice and the chocolate conglomerations. Glue, molasses, brown sugar, plaster, and lampblack, are among their beauties, with, for the latter, just sufficient real chocolate to give them a possible flavor. Licorice is cheap enough and nasty enough, but the addition of refuse molasses, glue, and lampblack, which is no unusual matter, makes it still more repulsive.
Metcalf & Company, extensive wholesale and retail druggists, kindly gave me the figures of cost on the first, second, and lower grades of gum arabic, glucose, etc. The first quality of gum arabic costs, by the cask, about sixty to seventy-five cents per pound; the lowest about twenty-two. There is a new manufacture in New York, with a “side issue,” wherein they necessarily turn out large quantities of glucose,—refuse from grain,—and this is sold for eight to thirteen cents a pound, to confectioners. It is much better than glue, but still the glue is used to-day, and I have on my table at this moment a sample of “gum drops” made this week in Boston from cheap glue, brown sugar, and a little Tonka bean flavor. The Tonka bean represents vanilla. These cost thirteen cents a pound, and are sometimes known, with the mucilage or glucose drops, to wholesale buyers, as “A. B.” drops, to distinguish them from pure gum arabic. The unfortunate consumer, however, is not informed regarding the difference.
Dangerous Acids.
“Sour drops,” or lemon drops, are sometimes flavored with lemon; but oil of lemon is costly, and sulphuric and nitric acids are cheap, and more extensively used in confectionery. I recently sat down with a friend, in a first-class restaurant, to a piece of “lemon pie,” etc. I took St. Paul’s advice, and partook of what was set before me, asking no questions for conscience’ sake. The next morning, meeting the friend,—a physician, by the way,—I asked him how he liked tartaric acid. He replied, “Very well in a drink, but not in pies.”
These acids are not only injurious to the teeth, but to the tender mucous membranes of the throat and stomach, engendering headache, colic-like pains, diarrhœa, and painful urinary diseases. Spirits of turpentine, or oil of turpentine, is extensively used in “peppermints;” also in essence of peppermint, often sold by peddlers, and in shops, as “pure essence.” I question if any druggist would retail such impure and dangerous articles, since he would know it at sight, and ought to be familiar with its evil effects when used freely, as people use essence of peppermint. What I have stated respecting the flavoring of soda syrups is applicable to confectionery.