Crowberry is an evergreen mat forming shrub, with small, light green needle-like leaves. The flowers are small and plain looking. The fruit is a fairly dry black berry, smaller than the alpine bearberry, but with somewhat better flavour, and looks similar to a blueberry. Anthocyanins of northern crowberry were extracted from the berry with acidified ethanol and purified with solvent extractions and ion exchange chromatography. The high concentration of anthocyanin pigment can be used as a natural food dye. Anthocyanin contents of crowberries vary from year to year according to the overall radiation and the number of hours of sunshine. The dark-colored crowberry juice contains about 45-50% of the total anthocyanins of the fruit and because of its relatively bland taste, it may have application as natural food colorant.