Research Reveals The Cup Color That Makes Hot Chocolate Taste Better

When you go to make some hot chocolate at home, you might find yourself reaching for the same cup that you always like to use. Or maybe there's a particular chain you love to get your cup of hot chocolate from. But if you've never paid close enough attention to the cup color you gravitate toward for your drink, it just might be worth thinking about. As it turns out, the color of the cup that your hot chocolate is in can actually affect how it tastes. 

In regards to color, a study published in the Journal of Food Science on how vision interacts with taste and smell, found that color can have an influence on how we feel about a particular food or drink. It can, for example, make food seem to have a more intense or better quality of flavor — all based on what we see. In fact, color can even affect how much we think we like a drink (or not).

As for that cup of hot chocolate, turns out there's one particular color of mug or cup that can apparently make the classic drink taste its absolute best.

When it comes to hot chocolate, the color orange (specifically, creamsicle) is the best color mug or cup to drink from. As reported by Popular Science, a 2013 study done by researchers from Oxford University and Polytechnic University of Valencia found that the brain associates orange with intensity, which apparently translates to a more flavorful hot chocolate.

Further, just as the study found that orange made the most of hot chocolate, it also found that white doesn't have the same effect. So, if you go to a chain that serves drinks in a white cup, you might want to bring your own cup to up the flavor of that hot chocolate. And for those who make hot chocolate at home, it might be worth giving an orange mug a try to see if you can taste a difference. 

Keep in mind that hot chocolate is not the only food and drink that is affected by the color of the serving ware either. The next time you make a plate or pour a glass of your favorite beverage, consider changing up the color of the dish you reach for. You just might find that your food or drink actually tastes better.