Red, yellow, green and purple - are rainbow carrots the way of the future? Perhaps, but they could more accurately be called the carrots of the past because they have a long history. Purple and yellow carrots were grown as many as 1,000 years ago in Asia and Western Europe, although selective breeding programs to produce such colors for commercial purposes are fairly recent. Carrots are now regularly bred in purple, red, yellow and white, in addition to orange, and scientists say that there is added nutritional benefit to choosing a colorful vegetable over a more conventional one.

Red carrots have extra lycopene, which is also found in tomatoes and is believed to lower blood pressure and help to reduce the risk of some cancers. Yellow carrots promote eye health with beta-carotene-like pigments, and purple carrots have powerful antioxidants.

Even with health benefits to recommend them, the carrots are not an easy sell. This is in part because neither consumers nor producers are really sure what to look for as a sign of a good purple carrot, whereas most people look for a good color and relatively smooth skin for an orange one. The bigger issue is that consumers don't know what they're going to taste like and are reluctant to branch out. But the carrots taste pretty much the same, regardless of their color, and some taste even sweeter than a standard carrot.

Some Trader Joe's locations started carrying the rainbow carrots this week, and they're worth a try if you see them there or at your local grocery store.

A younger exposure to wine is likely to foster an increase in appreciation of the beverage, so consumers will be looking not only for more wines, but for better wines. The problem is that you have to start somewhere and it can be difficult to know what you're getting by looking at the bottle. One strategy is to only take recommendations from friends and gradually branch out from there. Another is to extensively research each wine before you buy it, consulting the experts and the internet. If you are at the store and want to buy a bottle at that moment, however, you might face an impressive selection without a clue as to what to buy. Which bottle will you reach for?

An article in the New York Times Magazine reported that the sales of a specific sort of wine have reached over $600 million annually. It’s not burgundy, chardonnay or merlot - not specifically, anyway -  that’s selling, but it just might be the wine that you reach for when confronted with too many same-looking options: wines with animals on their labels.

It might seem like a label design would be an unreliable way to select a wine, but a great logo can help cement a good reputation in the mind of the buyer. And things besides wine are selected on their looks every day: book covers, clothing and potential dates. Why should wines stick to plain labels with scripted fonts when a bold design will jump out and grab a consumer's attention? My only question is why an animal label might attract a buyer more than a flashy, non-animal label, all other things being equal.

Whenever someone mentioned edible flowers to me, whether as part of a dish or used as a garnish, I nodded politely and did not think much of it. I considered edible flowers to be among the items that one can only find at a store with hard-to-find specialty ingredients - ingredients that I would probably never use, let alone actually need. This week, however, I spotted bags of hibiscus flowers at Trader Joe's.

Sold alongside the other dried fruits, the hibiscus flowers are dried and lightly sweetened. Apart from their beautiful dark fuchsiacolor, they taste pretty good. Slightly sweet and chewy, like fruit leather, they have a bit of a vegetal undertone that is not present in most dried fruits. I think that they'd make an attractive garnish for cakes and even a nice, unusual addition to a spring-time salad. They are not, however, something that I would eat by the handful.

[Photo by Nicole Weston]

The response to the photos of the Red Velvet Tie-Dyed Cheesecake from Walt Disney's Pop Century Resort was unanimous: we want the recipe! Short of tracking down the pastry chef and begging, getting the exact recipe might be a challenge. Fortunately, the components of the recipe are simple. It has a red velvet cake layer at the bottom instead of a more traditional crust and once it has been baked, the cake is topped with a cheesecake mixture and baked again. The colors in the cake are all produced with food coloring, including the red velvet cake layer. The best way to start here is by using a boxed cake mix, but if you cannot find a red velvet cake mix, buy a white cake mix and add 1 ounce (1 bottle) of red food coloring to it. It is sure to be a hit at any child's party and will probably be very popular at a party for grown-ups, too. Here is the recipe: