Dyed Pasta

So last night while I was watching the Australian Open, I decided to dye some pasta for my son. I pulled out a box of penne pasta and got to work. Here's what you'll need:

-dry pasta
-food coloring
-vinegar
-Ziplocs

I put between 10-15 drops of food coloring in each baggie, depending on how vibrant I wanted the colors to be. Then I added a TBS of vinegar and one cup of pasta. Seal the Ziploc and mix. I spread them out to dry on cookie sheets covered with both parchment paper and wax paper. Vinegar is acidic, so if it comes in contact with the metal cookie sheet, it tends to corrode it. Or maybe that's just because I'm using our super cheap cookie sheets for this. Maybe next time I will dry on a cutting board. Here's what it looked like drying:

The colors are actually a bit more vibrant after drying. In retrospect, the yellow food coloring was a bit pointless. :) I'm not 100% thrilled with this dying method as the noodles took a long time to dry and some of them got a bit soggy. Maybe that's just the nature of the beast when dying noodles, but I'd love to hear suggestions for improvement!

The reason I dyed these was so the Eskimo could practice stringing them onto a shoelace. And we did try this...

...and it lasted about 2 minutes. Then he got frustrated and decided to "cook" the noodles instead. He spent the next hour preparing the noodles in his kitchen and serving them to me. He put them in and out of different pots and bowls, "cut" them with his knife, and thoroughly enjoyed himself. Not the purpose for which the noodles were originally intended, but hey, he's having fun and that's all that matters!