This is now the second year, and still the search continues. There seems to be a shortage of green maraschino cherries in the world. Maybe it is one of those dreaded supply chain issues. Maybe it’s just a shortage of green dye. But green maraschino cherries have become a rare thing.
You can find candied ones, or glace if you prefer. They seem to be rather plentiful in both red and green colours. But not the maraschino ones. They seem to be red only over the last couple years.
The thing is, even the red ones don’t come in the beautiful candy red colour. They simply take light coloured cherries and treat them with preservatives and bleach them. Then add colour. They could make them any colour they want. But someone is making the choice that we no longer need green cherries.
This shouldn’t be hard to do. It’s just dye. They could even sell me the bleached ones and I could add my own food colouring. I probably even have some green at home already I could use.
Why do I need, not just green cherries, but specifically green maraschino cherries? It’s a Christmas baking thing. I have taken over some of the Christmas baking and one of the things on my list every year are these little chocolate ball type things with cherries inside. For many years we have played a bit of a game with these things, guessing which colour the cherry would be inside. Only having red cherries makes the game a whole lot easier.
The green glace cherries are great for decorating and that sort of thing, but the taste isn’t quite the same for putting them inside a lump of chocolate dough.
So I guess it’s red only again this year. Unless there’s a secret supply of green maraschino cherries hidden somewhere in the world.
