It’s pink. It’s sauce. What more could you want to know about Pink Sauce before consuming it? After all, what could possibly go wrong by putting something pink and gooey into your mouth? Well, clearly there have been a lot of questions about this so-called Pink Sauce that’s been promoted and sold by @chef.pii over the social media platform TikTok. Ever since Chef Pii showed herself dipping what appeared to be fried chicken in a mysterious pink sauce and then eating it in June, folks on social media have been essentially saying, “I have so many questions.” These questions have ranged from how does it taste to what’s actually in it to what’s up with the label and packaging to why the heck are people buying and consuming something when there are so many questions?
The following pair of tweets sort of summarize what’s been going on with this pink watery substance that sort of looks like Pepto-Bismol but isn’t Pepto-Bismol, at least it shouldn’t be:
As you can see, the second tweet included a TikTok video from @spillsesh_yt that began with “We need to talk about Pink Sauce and why are a lot of people are concerned about the people who bought this,” and went on to point out some of these concerns. One concern that @spillsesh_yt raised was why “The hue of the sauce keeps changing, every photo, every video, the sauce color looks different.” Yep, unless it’s entered the Quantum Realm or the Multi-verse, a product significantly changing in appearance without explanation might raise some red, or perhaps pink, flags.
Another concern has been one of taste. Typically, before ordering any type of food or drink item, you’d like to know how it tastes. That’s why you don’t put random things into your mouth so that you end playing some kind of tongue roulette. Yet, according to @spillsesh_yt, Chef Pii has not clearly described the taste of the sauce and has even indicated that she cannot describe the taste, Instead, Chef Pii has asked others to describe the taste of the concoction. In the video, @spillsesh_yt indicated that “I’ve been hearing that it kind of tastes like ranch, not exactly ranch, but basically ranch.” In this case, ranch presumably refers to ranch dressing rather than an area where livestock can graze and are raised, which might not be such a good taste.
Then there have been the bottled up concerns, so to speak, about Pink Sauce. @spillsesh_yt mentioned in the video, “now that people have purchased it and received it, they are noticing that there’s a lot of stuff that’s really sketchy with the bottle.” TikTokker @seansvv echoed some of the these concerns in a video saying, “There are so many errors on this nutritional label, saying 444 servings, which is 14.4 grams [per serving], which makes almost 6,300-something grams in the whole bottle, which is inaccurate. And if these small details were overlooked, I’m looking at quality control now. I’m kind of scared.” Yeah, 6300 grams or 6.3 kilograms would be quite a lot to fit inside a bottle. That would be about as heavy as a vacuum cleaner, three MacBook pros, or a bowling ball, as per the Weight of Stuff, which is a web site that talks about, you guessed it, the weight of stuff.
What are some of the other “small details” on the bottle that may have been overlooked? Well, @HotCommieGal pointed out in the following tweet that “vinger” was on the ingredients list for Pink Saunce:
Now, “vinger” presumably was a misspelling of “vinegar” or maybe “vinegar” said very quickly rather than a misspelling of “ginger.” It better not have been “vinger” as defined by the Dutch-English translation in the Cambridge Dictionary: “One of the five end parts of the hand, sometimes excluding the thumb.” Yeah, any part of someone’s hand would not be good in sauce. You don’t want the phrase, “You’ve got to hand it to the people who bought the sauce,” to be a literal statement.
This is a reminder that just because you see what looks like a “Nutrition Facts” label on a product doesn’t mean that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has given its seal of approval. These days anyone with computer and the proper software can put together what looks like a “Nutrition Facts” label. And the FDA doesn’t have the resources right now to find and police each and every incidence of such a label.
Besides “vinger,” the label listed water, sunflower seed oil, raw honey, garlic, pitaya, Pink Himalayan sea salt, less than 2% of dried spices, lemon juice, milk, and citric acid. If you are wondering, “shouldn’t milk stay refrigerated,” you wouldn’t be the only one:
Consuming anything that hasn’t been properly packed, stored, and transported could be essentially playing a game of craps in more ways than one. For example, dairy products such as milk can readily spoil and carry some nasty pathogens when proper precautions aren’t taken. Such pathogens could end up causing a bad bout of diarrhea and potentially even life-threatening conditions. This Pink Sauce may have gone viral, but the biggest concern is whether it may go bacterial in a bad way.
People on social media did talk about wanting small businesses to have an opportunity to succeed in general. And what’s happened with Pink Sauce has shown how something on TikTok can get attention fairly quickly. Heck even Netflix tweeted something about pink sauce:
It’s not clear whether the Netflix tweet was about “Pink Sauce” or about just sauce that’s pink.
Regardless, while more analysis may be needed to determine what specifically is in Pink Sauce, how it’s been handled, and how that may affect your health, it’s important for consumers to take standard precautions before just putting anything in your mouth. Ask specifically what ingredients are in the product. Try to get a verified list. Look for any ingredients that may be unknown, mysterious, or spelled by someone in a hurry. Make sure that you get some guarantees as to how the product is being handled and shipped in a safe manner. And for Pete’s sake and the sake of everyone else around you, make sure you have an idea of what the product tastes like. You don’t want a product that doesn’t leave you in the pink, so to speak.