Annatto Seeds (Achiote): Color, Flavor, Bixin and How to Cook With Them

Most of the annatto traded around the world ends up in cheese: PROSEA reports that about 70% of the annatto imported into consuming countries goes into cheese-making.¹ Annatto seeds are mostly about color. The red-orange coating on the seed colors cheese, butter and margarine, and in home kitchens it’s behind the brick-red marinades of Yucatán and the golden cooking fat of the Caribbean. Called achiote in Mexico, the seeds come from the fruit of Bixa orellana, a small tree native from Mexico to tropical South America.

At a glance

What annatto is

Annatto is a shrub or small tree of the wet tropics, now grown in tropical and subtropical regions all over the world. Its brown fruits are about 5 cm long. Inside, the seeds carry a coating of red pigment. The species name honors Francisco de Orellana, the Spanish explorer of the Amazon. “Achiote” comes from Nahuatl, and “annatto” from a Carib word.

Color, flavor and the compounds behind them

Color

The red comes from apocarotenoids, compounds formed when carotenoids split, and bixin is the big one. It can make up as much as 80% of the total pigment in some seeds.² Norbixin is its water-soluble counterpart. You’ll find annatto sold commercially in both oil-based and water-based forms. PROSEA describes extracting the dye by soaking seeds in water, and preparing it as a solution in vegetable oil.¹ EFSA also assesses bixin-based and norbixin-based extracts separately.⁵

Pigment content varies. Katzer gives 2–5% of seed dry mass as common values, and PROSEA reports 1.6–5.3% bixin on an oven-dry basis in seed from Papua New Guinea, with figures up to 12% reported elsewhere.³¹ Commercial extracts run from under 1% to over 85% bixin or norbixin, depending on the type.² Those are different measurements of different materials, so don’t line them up against each other.

Flavor

Katzer describes dried annatto seeds as having a weak, perfumed smell. Fresh seeds are much more aromatic, he notes, but the aroma doesn’t carry into the food.³ Cooks often describe a faint earthy, peppery or slightly nutty note. In most dishes, though, annatto is there for color.

Origin and history

Kew gives the native range as Mexico to southern tropical America. People have used annatto as a food colorant and spice since before colonization, and a 2016 review notes its use as a coloring agent in pre-Hispanic Maya religious ceremonies.² Katzer mentions reports that the Aztecs’ drinking chocolate contained annatto seeds, which he finds plausible, and says using annatto to deepen the color of chocolate was common in Europe until the 17th century.³

You’ll see a few popular claims we couldn’t trace: that the Aztecs and Maya used annatto as a stand-in for blood in rituals or as writing ink, and that Europeans started exporting it in the 18th century. PROSEA records body painting with the dye in Papua New Guinea, not in the Americas.¹

How annatto is used

As a food color

Britannica lists butter, cheese and margarine among the foods annatto colors. PROSEA adds rice, candy, oils, ice cream and bakery products, and reports that about 70% of the annatto imported into consuming countries goes into cheese-making.¹ Rivera-Madrid and colleagues list dairy and bakery products, vegetable oils, beverages and dietary supplements.

In cooking

• Mexico (Yucatán). Meat is often marinated in a spice paste called recado, and food made this way is called pibil. For the ground form, see achiote powder.
• The Caribbean. Seeds are fried in animal or vegetable fat, and the colored fat then goes into cooking vegetables or meat, turning them golden yellow to golden brown.
• Philippines. The seeds are often ground and added to soups and stews.
• Vietnam. Annatto oil goes into coconut-based curries to improve their color.

To make annatto oil at home, warm the seeds gently in oil until it turns deep orange, then strain. Overheat them and the seeds go dark and bitter. For more, see cooking with annatto seeds.

Buying and quality

Look for whole seeds that are bright brick red, not brown. Dull seeds have lost pigment. That’s a rule of thumb, not a formal standard. PROSEA notes that the dye is sensitive to light. Whole seeds are very hard, and a lot of cooks soak them or keep a dedicated grinder.

Storage

We couldn’t find a published shelf-life figure for annatto seeds from a regulator or standards body. Since PROSEA notes the dye is light-sensitive, keep seeds and powder in an opaque, sealed container away from heat and light.¹

Safety and regulation

United States. Annatto extract, made from annatto seed, is listed as a color additive at 21 CFR 73.30. It can be used to color foods generally in amounts consistent with good manufacturing practice, except foods with standards of identity that don’t allow added color, and batches are exempt from FDA certification.⁴

European Union. Annatto extracts are the food additive E 160b. In 2016 EFSA set an acceptable daily intake of 6 mg/kg body weight per day for bixin and 0.3 mg/kg body weight per day for norbixin. Estimated bixin exposure was below its ADI for every population group. For norbixin, some high consumers could go over it under a proposed extension of use.⁵

Allergy. Allergic reactions to annatto have been documented. A 1991 case report in Annals of Allergy described a patient who developed hives, swelling and severely low blood pressure within 20 minutes of eating a breakfast cereal that contained annatto dye. Skin tests to milk, wheat and corn were negative, while skin testing to annatto was strongly positive, and the patient’s IgE antibodies bound to a protein in the extract.⁶

PROSEA also notes that a very poisonous substance has been found in the seed’s embryo. It doesn’t say whether this matters at the amounts you’d cook with, and none of the regulator sources we found raise it.¹

Health claims

Bixin and norbixin are carotenoid derivatives, and there’s laboratory and animal work on their antioxidant activity.² That isn’t evidence that annatto in your food protects your eyes, bones or anything else, and we’re not claiming it does. The calcium and folate figures that circulate for annatto seeds are another gap: we couldn’t check them against a nutrient database.

Substitutes and comparisons

• Annatto seeds substitutes
• Achiote powder
• Saffron, turmeric and paprika, the other common food colors in the spice rack