I watched Koroshiya 1 (Ichi The Killer) last night and found it to be good wholesome fun. I enjoy good game of entrail jump-rope as much as, or even more than, the next person. That said, this here is really kinda nasty. It isn't the idea of being unknowingly fed crushed up bugs that bothers me in any way, it is the bugs themselves. These boys are nasty.
From CNN.com:
WASHINGTON (AP) -- That ice cream you're eating or the lipstick you're wearing just might contain extract from crushed bugs. On purpose.
The Food and Drug Administration proposed Friday requiring food and cosmetic labels to list cochineal extract or carmine if a product's ingredients include either of the two red colorings that have been extracted from the ground bodies of an insect known since the time of the Aztecs.
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The widespread use of the dyes in everything from yogurt to lipstick hasn't exactly been well-disclosed: The ingredients typically are listed as "color added" or "E120," the FDA said.
Carmine puts the red in ice cream, strawberry milk, fake crab and lobster, fruit cocktail cherries, port wine cheese, lumpfish eggs and liqueurs like Campari, according to the FDA. Carmine is also used in lipstick, makeup base, eye shadow, eyeliners, nail polishes and baby products, the agency said. Meanwhile, cochineal extract shows up in fruit drinks, candy, yogurt and some processed foods.
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Not that the stuff hasn't been around long: Indians living in pre-Columbian Mexico were the first to recognize a cactus-sucking insect called the Dactylopius coccus costa was a good source of dye.
