PRETTY IN PINK

Why did scientists put tangerine DNA in a pineapple-and can this Frankenfruit help change public opinion toward bioengineered foods?

- EMILY MULLLIN

ON A RECENT trip to Giant Eagle, my local grocery store in Pittsburgh, I noticed something new in the fruit section: a single pineapple packaged in a pink and forest-green box. A picture on the front showed the pineapple cut open, revealing rose-colored flesh. Touted as the "jewel of the jungle," the fruit was the Pink glow pineapple, a creation of American food giant Fresh Del Monte.

It cost $9.99, a little more than double the price of a regular yellow pineapple.

I put the box in my cart, snapped a picture with my phone, and shared the find with my foodie friends. I mentioned that its color is the result of genetic modification-the box included a "made possible through bioengineering" label-but that didn't seem to faze anyone. When I brought my Pinkglow to a Super Bowl party, people oohed and aahed over the color and then gobbled it down. It was juicier and less tart than a regular pineapple, and there was another difference: It came with the characteristic crown chopped off. Soon enough, my friends were buying pink pineapples too. One used a Pink glow to brew homemade tepache, a fermented drink made from pineapple peels that was invented in pre-Columbian Mexico.

At a time when orange cauliflower and white strawberries are now common sights in American grocery stores, a non-yellow pineapple doesn't seem all that out of place. Still, I wondered: Why now with the flashy presentation? And why pink? And why had my friends and I snapped it right up?