Purple is my favourite colour so I was happy to see purple foods feature in food industry news this week. Here is the lowdown on purple foods and four other fun food facts that have caught my eye recently:

Pasta made from crickets has hit the mainstream (or maybe the fringe of the mainstream…) and is available to buy commercially. The pasta is made with farmed crickets that have been roasted, ground and combined with rice and tapioca to make gluten-free pasta. It is reported to have a nutty flavour and be high in protein. Buy your insect pasta here. Or for the scientifically minded, read the European Food Safety Authority’s report on the risk profile of insects as food and feed. At Stockholm’s Arlanda airport there is a ‘hotel’ for sourdough starters, the fermented mixtures used for making sourdough bread. Sourdough starters contain flour, wild yeasts and bacteria and can be maintained for generations, fermenting away between batches of bread. Individual starters develop their own unique flavours and the older the starter, the tangier the loaf, but a starter needs to be ‘fed’ and watered regularly. At the sourdough hotel you can leave your starter in the care of an expert baker while you travel. Prison kitchens put aside a portion from each meal they serve and freeze it in case of a food poisoning outbreak. The sample is known as a ‘dead man’s tray’. The experts in food trend predictions are reporting that purple foods are the next big thing. Purple carrots, berry-based breakfasts, purple yams, purple cauliflower, berry-flavoured dairy products and porridge plus berry drinkable yoghurt are all on the menu for the coming year. Lobster rolls are also predicted to be huge this year and the good news is you can cook them in your dishwasher while washing your dishes! Shape Magazine thoughtfully shares the recipe: put a halved, deveined, de-shelled lobster tail in a mason jar with a stick of unsalted butter and run it through your wash cycle. Serve in a roll.