Abstract: Packaged fresh food is one of the factors that negatively affect the shelf life; It is at the forefront that the liquid percolated by food accumulates inside of the package, accelerating chemical and microbial spoilage and finalized with reducing food quality. In order to prevent the accumulation of liquid in the package, the absorbent pads disposed therein are partially presented as a solution of the problem. The aim of this research is to enrich absorbent pads with naturally derived antioxidants to make them more functional and extend the shelf life of food. It is also possible to easily inform the consumer about the quality of food with the expected color change in the absorbent pad. This is the first study by making use of the extract of red cabbage plant and preparing absorbent pads by combining with cellulose for examination of color change on the pad through microbial growth by time. In this study, 25 gr of trout sample were used to observe color change on the fresh prepared food pads. Each pad was prepared using 5 ml of red cabbage extract (1:1 ratio) and dried. Salmonella typhi ATCC 14028, Escherichia coli ATCC 25893, and Staphylococcus aureus 25922 were inoculated to each fish sample to make the microbial growth faster. After 12 hours, color change on the pad was observed with a naked eye that purple-red cabbage color was changed to greenish-blue. However, pH measurements also showed a similar result with the color change and pH value (6.3) observed in the fresh fish increased to 9.0 on day 3.