A study in color.

The International Food Information Council, a media relations organization that represents the interests of the processed foods industry, often with the express cooperation of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), defines a color additive as 'any dye, pigment or substance which when added or applied to a food, drug or cosmetic, or to the human body, is capable (alone or through reactions with other substances) of importing color ... Without color additives, colas wouldn't be brown, margarine wouldn't be yellow and mint ice cream wouldn't be green."

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They're talking about the water-soluble dyes and fat-soluble lakes, like FD & C Blue dye No. 1, that make possible such treasures as blue M & M[R] candies and pink Hostess[R] Snowballs. They're also talking about natural additives such as annatto extract, carrot oil, turmeric, vegetable juices and the controversial cochineal extract, whose characteristic rosy hue is derived from the eggs of the Peruvian cochineal beetle. The Mixtec Indians, inhabitants of pre-Hispanic Mexico, first dried and ground the beetles for use in fabric dyes.

According to the FDA, cochineal extract and carmine, the lake form of the additive, have been used since the late 1800s in such foods as pork sausages, ice cream, strawberry-flavored milk, imitation crab and lobster, maraschino cherries, Port wine cheeses, lumpfish eggs and colored spirits like Campari[R]. Because the FDA does not currently require manufacturers to specifically indicate the presence of cochineal extract on their labels, allowing them to use the catch-all term "natural color," strict vegetarians, the insect-allergic and those who observe Kosher dietary law have been agitating for label-legislation change.

Chefs are likely less perturbed than most to discover that so many foods contain ground beetles-they're animals, after all--but for those who wish to limit the bugs to their competitors' dining rooms, may we recommend beet juice, berries, or red cabbage for your food coloring needs?

Sometime in approximately the first ten minutes of your culinary school education, or, on the very day you graduate from cleaning vegetables to being allowed to blanch them, you learn your lessons about food and color: creating contrasts in your presentation, keeping string beans bright green, acidulating your apples and artichokes, finishing a dish with a pinch of finely chopped parsley.

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Sometimes a dish becomes a best-seller based on the way you describe its color on the menu, especially if it hints at the unusual: black chickpeas, green-lipped mussels, yellow beets, purple potatoes.

And sometimes, good food succeeds in spite of its color. "If you asked me to make a menu of classic Escoffier dishes, they would all be delicious and technically perfect, but they would all be brown and red, with maybe a little green," says Will Goldfarb, executive chef and partner at New York's Room 4 Dessert. Art Culinaire has challenged Goldfarb to create several plates, each one based on a single color. Turn the page to see the fantastical results, and to learn about Goldfarb's odyssey from would-be attorney, to the elBulli kitchen, to the man who might change the way we eat dessert.

RELATED ARTICLE: Will Gol farb

Room 4 Dessert

New York, New York

Will Goldfarb, recently named one of the ten best pastry chefs in America by Chocolatier and Pastry Art & Design magazines, describes his early days in the European restaurant business in such a way that you can't help but wonder how he ever got past zesting lemons.

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As a new graduate of Duke University with scant kitchen experience, the Glen Cove, New York native was headed for law school at the University of Southern California, but decided first to--spend a year abroad. Goldfarb enrolled in a pastry program at Le Cordon Bleu in Paris, and despite not knowing a word of French, talked his way into a stage at a bistro owned by friends of his family.

"I was terrible at it," he admits cheerfully. "I was bad at making plated desserts. I couldn't see well, because I didn't like wearing my glasses to work. My hands were poor, I was very clumsy, and small details were not my specialty. It took me about 1,000 tries to finally make a nice-looking quenelle. It took me about six months to get the dexterity to crack an egg correctly." A more practical-minded cook might have sought out the savory side of the business, or followed through with law school, but Goldfarb was intrigued, rather than discouraged; by the challenge.

"Cooking came very naturally to me, whereas pastry didn't," he explains. "I knew that I'd stay interested in pastry longer, because I had so much to learn." By the time the bistro's owners offered him a job, Goldfarb felt he'd outgrown the place, and went instead to a stage at Gerard Mulot's highly-regarded Parisian bakery, followed by a stint as a private chef, and later, a stage at Cibreo, in Florence, Italy. He describes that experience as "crazy, just getting my butt kicked every day, chopping fifly pounds of onions at a time." While in Italy, he began to read one of the books published by the Adria brothers of elBulli, thereby finding his next culinary mission "I just got tunnel vision on that place," he recalls. "I had to stage there" While hiding from immigration officers in Cibreo's business office, Goldfarb placed a call to elBulli, only to be told that it was the end of the 1998 season, and that the restaurant would close the next day, for six months. Goldfarb cooled his heels in Nice, throwing parties to support himself, and drove to Barcelona in the spring of 1999, a few weeks before elBulli

re-opened, to take a crash course in Catalan and help out in the catering division. Once the mothership opened for the season, he was assigned to the pastry kitchen. "It was the summer that the restaurant blew up internationally," he says, "and I was always having to help out with photo shoots, because no one else spoke English." Once again, he found himself getting his "butt kicked, from one end of the kitchen to the other. I was by far the worst guy in the kitchen. Whatever people say about the Michelin guide to try and pretend it's not important, it's different when you're working to keep your three stars every day, trying to make everything perfect, all day long."

While in Spain, Goldfarb met Kasper Kurdahl, a Danish chef who shared his ideas about food and creativity. The pair began to write a kind of creativity manifesto, gave themselves the name AKWA, and were shortly joined in their efforts by chefs Davide Scabin and Ruben Garcia.

"The mission," Goldfarb wrote in a Gastronomica magazine article entitled "AKWA. Commercializing Creativity," "was to make tangible the truths we held to be self-evident in cooking: the need for life, the need for love, the need for magic, and the need for sanctuary. We felt both bold enough to articulate these new ideas and egotistical enough to imagine that we had uncovered profound gastronomic truths." Food journalists began to refer to the foursome as "the future of cooking," and after a successful appearance at Turin's Salon del Gusto, they signed a contract on a cavernous downtown Manhattan space that would become their laboratory and headquarters--but it was not to be. In what has become an all-too-familiar story, the events of September 11, 2001 forced the group to temporarily shelve their plans.

Goldfarb went on to cook at New Jersey's Ryland Inn, and later, to run a resort on the Caribbean island of Anguilla, an assignment that was truncated by his being kicked off the island for disciplining the nephew of the prime minister, whom he'd caught changing the clock so that his workday would end sooner. Back in the States, he joined Paul Liebrandt at the short-lived but much-ballyhooed Papillon, messed around in "a few jobs that aren't even worth mentioning," and finally landed at Cru, where his relentless creativity in the pastry kitchen rankled some reviewers and made for a shorter tenure than he'd anticipated. He spent some time in Philadelphia, creating desserts for Morimoto, and returned to New York in the fall of 2005 to open Room 4 Dessert, a narrow bar serving sweet confections in flights of four, along with a cheese plate, wine and liquor.

Does the broadly punny name seem a bit simplistic in the context of AKWA's creativity manifesto, with its references to Gaussian grids, for example, and the texts of German poet Rainer Maria Rilke? Maybe, but according to Goldfarb, it may just be the ultimate expression of commercializing creativity. "The idea is to roll this concept out across the country," he explains, "and you could see a catchy name like Room 4 Dessert in a shopping mall in any city in America."

RELATED ARTICLE: Coco-Cola (Serves 4)

For the soda: In saucepan, bring sugar and water to boil, stirring to dissolve. Remove from heat, whisk in xanthan gum and let cool. Add coconut water and strain through fine-mesh sieve. Refrigerate until cold. Place in soda siphon and charge with carbon dioxide according to manufacturer's instructions.

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To serve: Fill tall glass with soda, top with coconut cream powder and serve.

For the soda:

5 1/2 ounces granulated sugar
6 ounces water
1 teaspoon xanthan gum*
32 ounces coconut water**

For the garnish:

Conconut cream powder***

*Powder derived from Xanthonomonos campestris, a microorganism. Has binding and emulsifying properties. Available through Willpowder, [phone] or www.willpowder.net.

**The clear liquid from the center of the coconut. Available through VitaCoco, [phone] or www.vitacoco.com.

***Available through Thai Supermarket Online, [phone] or www.importfood.com.

RELATED ARTICLE: Blackberry Beretta (Serves 12)

Snakebite and Black++

++Pour 1 ounce creme de cassis into pint glass, ado 8

ounces hard cider and 8 ounces Guinness, and serve

For the squid ink brioche: In bowl of mixer fitted with paddle, combine flour, sugar, salt and yeast. Add two eggs and mix on low speed until eggs are incorporated. Add remaining egg and mix on medium speed until dough is shiny and elastic, about ten minutes. Add butter to dough and mix until incorporated. Cover and let rest one hour, then refrigerate 24 hours. Mix in squid ink just enough to marble the dough. Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Butter and flour 12 individual brioche molds Divide dough between molds and let rise until doubled in volume, about one hour. Bake 10 minutes, remove from oven and let cool.

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For the cocoa glaze: In saucepan, combine water, sugar and cocoa powder and bring to boil. Reduce until mixture coats back of wooden spoon. Strain through fine-mesh sieve and refrigerate until ready to use.

For the blackberry "confit": In saucepan, combine water and sugar and bring to boil, stirring to dissolve sugar. Remove from heat and let cool completely. Transfer to vacuum-sealing bag, add blackberries and cossis and seal. Bring large pot of water to 130 degrees. Place bag in water and cook one hour. Transfer mixture to food processor fitted with metal blade and puree until smooth. Strain through fine-mesh sieve and let cool completely.

For the rum gel: In saucepan, combine water and sugar and bring to boil. Add agar-agar and simmer five minutes, stirring constantly. Remove from heat, stir in rum and let cool until set. Transfer to VitaPrep[R] and puree until smooth. Strain through fine-mesh sieve and set aside.

To serve: Place brioche on plate and drizzle with cocoa glaze. Top with blackberries, confit and rum get, sprinkle with licorice root and serve.

For the squid ink brioche:

9 ounces all-purpose flour
2 ounces granulated sugar
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 ounce fresh yeast
3 eggs
9 ounce butter, cubed and room temperature
1 3/4 ounces squid ink

For the cocoa glaze:

4 ounces water
3 ounces granulated sugar
3 1/2 ounces cocoa powder

For the blackberry "confit":

6 ounces water
3 1 ounces granulated sugar
9 ounces blackberries
1 ounce cassis

For the rum gel:

12 ounces water
8 ounces muscovado sugar*
1/4 ounce agar-agar**
5 ounces dark rum

To serve:

Blackberries
Ground licorice root

*Dork, partially refined raw sugar with strong molasses flavor. Available at heath food markets.

**Available through Willpowder, [phone] or www.willpowder.nel.

Note: VilaPrep[R] machines are available through VitaMix, [phone] or www.vitamix.com.

RELATED ARTICLE: Orange (Serves 4)

Earl Grey with Blue Flowers tea++

++Available through Upton Tea Imports, [phone] or www.uptonteo.com.

For the mango sorbet: In food processor fitted with metal blade, puree mango and pass through fine-mesh sieve. Freeze in Pacojet[R] beaker for eight hours. Process sorbet in Pacojet[R] according to manufacturer's instructions Keep frozen until ready to use.

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For the passion fruit sponge: In saucepan, bring sugar and one cup water to boil and remove from heat. Squeeze excess water from gelatin and stir into mixture. Transfer to food processor fitted with metal blade. In bowl, whisk together egg white powder and remaining water. Add egg mixture and passion fruit to mixture in food processor and puree until emulsified. Pass through fine-mesh sieve, transfer to bowl and chill to 39 degrees in refrigerator. Using immersion blender, whip mixture until airy. Transfer to pastry bag fitted with #10 tip. Pipe into Flexipan[R] barquette molds and freeze.

For the carrot saffron gnocchi: Bring large pot of water to 175 degrees. Combine carrots, milk, syrup, saffron and salt in plastic bag and vacuum-seal. Poach in water one hour. Drain carrots, discarding liquid. Transfer to food processor fitted with metal blade and puree until smooth. Transfer to bowl and stir in calcium lactate. Bring separate large pot of water to simmer and stir in sodium alginate. Carefully drop small spoonfuls of carrot mixture into water and cook until set, about three minutes. Drain and chill in ice water bath. Drain well.

To serve: Arrange sponge and gnocchi on plate. Top with quenelle of sorbet. Garnish with mace and squash blossom and serve.

For the mango sorbet:

3 ripe mangoes, peeled, pitted and coarsely chopped

For the passion fruit sponge:

10 1/2 ounces granulated sugar
10 ounces water
2 sheets gelatin, softened in cold water
3 1/2 ounces egg white powder*
10 1/2 ounces passion fruit pulp

For the carrot saffron gnocchi:

2 1/4 pounds carrots, peeled and coarsely chopped
32 ounces milk
7 ounces maple syrup
1 1/4 teaspoons saffron threads
3/4 ounce coarse gray sea salt
1/4 ounce calcium lactate**
32 ounces water
1/2 ounce sodium alginate***

For the garnish:

Ground mace
Squash blossoms

*Available through Willpowder, [phone] or www.willpowdernet.

**A salt used as a leavening agent. Available through Willpowder, [phone] or www.willpowder.net.

***The sell of alginic acid, a seaweed extract used as a thickener and emulsifier. Available through Willpowder, [phone] or www.willpowder.net.

Note: Pacojet[R] is a machine used to make frozen confections to order. For more information, call [phone] or visil www.pacojet.com.

Note: Flexipan[R] barquette molds are available through JB Prince, [phone] or www.jbprince.com.

RELATED ARTICLE: Scarlett Johansson (Serves 4)

Single-malt whiskey

Suntory

Osaka, Japan

For the neutral base: In saucepan, bring water and sugar to boil, stirring to dissolve sugar. Remove from heat and stir in trimoline, glucose, dextrose and stabilizer. Let cool to room temperature and reserve.

For the beet sorbet: In bowl, stir together all ingredients. Freeze in Pacojet[R] beaker for eight hours. Process sorbet in Pacojet[R] according to manufacturer's instructions. Keep frozen until ready to use.

For the sangria: In saucepan, bring water and sugar to boil, stirring to dissolve sugar. Remove from heat, stir in xanthan gum and let cool to room temperature. Transfer to blender, add raspberries and blend until emulsified. Place in soda siphon and charge siphon with carbon dioxide cartridge according to manufacturer's instructions. Refrigerate until ready to use.

For the pomegranate bread: In saucepan, bring sugar and all but 1/4 cup water to boil, stirring to dissolve sugar. Remove from heat. Squeeze excess water from gelatin and stir into sugar mixture. In large bowl, combine egg white powder and remaining water. Add sugar mixture and pomegranate juice, and using immersion blender, blend until emulsified. Refrigerate until mixture is 39 degrees. Using immersion blender, blend again until mixture is frothy. Spread on dehydrator tray and dehydrate at 90 degrees for 48 hours, or until completely dry.

To serve: Break pomegranate bread into desired shapes and arrange on plate with sorbet and sangria. Garnish with micro greens and serve.

For the neutral base:

3 ounces water
2 1/2 ounces granulated sugar
1 ounce trimoline*
1 1/2 ounces glucose
1/2 ounce dextrose
1/2 teaspoon Cremodan[R] 64 sorbet stabilizer**

For the beet sorbet:

8 ounces best juice
2 ounces water
3 ounces neutral base, from above

For the sangria:

4 ounces water
1 3/4 ounces granulated sugar
1/4 teaspoon xanthan gum***
13 ounces raspberries

For the pomegranate bread:

7 ounces granulated sugar
9 ounces water
2 sheets gelatin, softened in cold water
3 ounces egg white powder
8 ounces pomegranate juice

For the garnish:

Micro beet greens

*Liauid invert sugar. Available though pastry suppliers.

**Available through Paris Gourmet, [phone] or www.parisgourmet.com.

***Powder derived from Xanthonomonas campestris, a microorganism. Has binding and emulsifying properties. Available through Willpowder, [phone] or www.willpowder.net.

Note: Pacojet[R] is a machine used to make frozen confections to order. For more information, call [phone] or visit www.pacojet.com.

RELATED ARTICLE: Diffusion Rouge Homage to Pierre Gagnaire (Serves 12)

Barolo Monprivato

Guiseppe Mascarello

Piedmont, Italy 1978

For the hibiscus jello: in saucepan, bring water and sugar to boil, stirring to dissolve sugar. Remove from heat and let cool. Transfer to bowl and stir in vodka and hibiscus. Cover and refrigerate 48 hours to infuse. Strain through fine-mesh sieve, discarding hibiscus. Place gelatin in bowl and stir in 1 1/2 cups infused liquid to soften gelatin. In saucepan, heat remaining infused liquid over medium heat to simmer. Whisk in softened gelatin mixture until dissolved. Pour into deep rectangular pan and let cool. Refrigerate to set completely.

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For the red wine reduction: In non-reactive saucepan, bring wine and sugar to boil. Reduce until mixture coats back of wooden spoon. Remove from heat and let cool. Refrigerate until ready to use.

To serve: Unmold jello and cut into 12 portions. Arrange one rectangle on plate. Using flavor injector fitted with medium tip, inject red wine reduction into center of jello and serve.

For the hibiscus Jello:

32 ounces water
5 ounces granulated sugar
1 ounce vodka
3 1/2 ounces dried hibiscus*
2 3/4 ounces powdered gelatin

For the red wine reduction:

32 ounces red wine
1 3/4 ounces granulated sugar

*Available through Willpowder, [phone] or www.willpowder.net.