The Red Market 🍒

As the impending Red Dye 3 ban in the USA unfolds, the UK baking community is being presented with a clandestine opportunity: an underground maraschino cherry trade.

My instantaneous reaction to seeing maraschino cherries on the list of affected foods was “What about the Instagram cakes?!”

You may or may not be familiar with The Cakes, but if you follow or know of any woman on social media, you’ve probably seen them. I am very familiar with them, having had one for my thirtieth birthday only a few months ago.

Shiny, glacé cherries, old-timey ruffles, a pastel palette of every colour imaginable — nothing short of a sweet-toothed wonderland. - Lucy Cocoran, Elle UK

Red dye 3, also known as erythrosine, is a synthetic dye. The dye is used in some foods to create a bright, cherry-red colour. It’s derived from petroleum. The FDA's upcoming ban will affect the likes of Nesquick’s strawberry-flavoured milk, Pez, Candy Corns, and certain brands of maraschino cherries.

Are we really surprised when we see this selection of foods, though? Pez has, and always will be, creepy as fuck.

Headline: “Shock! Horror! As Spongebob-themed edible food deemed unsafe for consumption human.”

Although heavily restricted in the UK — maraschino cherries available in the UK contain just enough Red Dye 3 to maintain the iconic artificial glow within the FSA’s regulatory threshold. Are our cherries now potential contraband?

Luckily for our trans-Atlantic cousins, there are actually a few brands like Luxardo and Mezzetta that don't use the soon to be outlawed dye. So don’t worry about setting up an Etsy dedicated to black market maraschino cherries just yet.

You can thank the God’s of Baking that the vintage-Marie-Antoinette-cream-dream inspired cakes can, for now, continue their reign safely over the female population of the UK. Although, Pinterest's 2025 trend prediction report declared "Chaos Cakes" are the next big thing.

These are deliberately chaotic works of abstract baked art look like something Salvador Dalí would have made — if he were a 20-something year old girl with a Pinterest account, a jar of FSA regulated maraschino cherries, and a Kitchen Aid.

I think they’re unlikely to completely dethrone our beloved cherry-topped creations. There's something universally appealing about a perfectly placed maraschino cherry gleaming atop a swirl of pastel buttercream.