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FDA warns top U.S. bakery not to claim foods contain allergens when they don't

npr.org

351–360 of 605 posts

Re: FDA warns top U.S. bakery not to claim foods contain allergens when they don't

#351

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not a bad idea actually. If some people can die of sesame seeds, the rest of us can manage without, sprinkle the seeds on our bread at home or bake our own bread if we can't live without sesame seeds.

If you're going to do that, then you need to ban all prepared foods from having any kind of allergen, because someone might die of it. That means bread made with wheat is now illegal, because some people are highly allergic to gluten. If you don't want gluten-free bread, you'll have to make it yourself. Also, you can't have any food with shrimp or shellfish. Peanut butter is now illegal (but you can make it yourself)…

Nice collection of straw-men, but elsewhere in discussion it has been made clear how the situation with sesame in bread is not comparable to your cases.

Re: FDA warns top U.S. bakery not to claim foods contain allergens when they don't

#352
post #327

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not at all. Even in this industrial society it is possible to buy raw ingredients and cook yourself and many people do it. (and as far as I know, many studies imply that is healthier, than heavily processed food, filled with conservatives, additives and whatever)

>Even in this industrial society it is possible to buy raw ingredients and cook yourself and many people do it. Those raw ingredients are also "industrial products". Did you think that bag of flour you bought was hand-milled by someone after they hand-picked the wheat? It came from a factory, just like most store-bought bread.

Actually one can buy hand milled flour, but I do not think that makes sense. I am not against big machines (and milling has not been done by hand for centuries). I am against adding all kind of things into my food, that happened to not be proofen cancer inducing yet.

Re: FDA warns top U.S. bakery not to claim foods contain allergens when they don't

#353
post #323

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"will have to cook their own bread at home now" Serious question as a non native english speaker, is this a correct way of saying it? I think bread is usually baked in an oven ..

Don’t know the actual stats but (UK here) lots of people who make bread at home use a dedicated bread machine

It is still an small oven, not a cooking pot ..

(some bread you can also make in a pan, but you cannot cook bread in my understanding)

Re: FDA warns top U.S. bakery not to claim foods contain allergens when they don't

#354

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The article says that is precisely what they did and the FDA found that it violated the spirit of the law.

Or admit the law that was being applied was actually 'the law of unintended consequences'.

They should ban unintended consequences, that'll work out fine.

Re: FDA warns top U.S. bakery not to claim foods contain allergens when they don't

#355
post #318

My understanding is this allergen over-labeling was inspired by the FDA in the first place. https://www.fastcompany.com/90830854/sesame-seed-allergen-fd... From the linked article (from Jan 2023): But sesame does differ in one distinct way from eggs, peanuts, shellfish, milk, and soy: The seeds are teeny tiny and hard to keep track of. This means they’re prone to “cross-contamination,” in food-allergy terms. If you o…

(Non US) On almost all food labels that I've seen for the last decade or so I've seen disclaimers like "this product is made in a factory that processes $ALLERGEN" Usually $ALLERGEN is "tree nuts".

(France) "trace of nuts" "may contain accidental presence of nuts" "made in a workshop that processes nuts"

Certain products specifically for allergy sufferers have strange messages such as "non-quantifiable presence of an allergen". A PCR test can detect traces of a product's DNA, but it is impossible to quantify its volume because it is so small, or to trace the source of contamination.

They can't say there aren't any, there's no defined threshold or it's not possible to clearly quantify the quantity.

Re: FDA warns top U.S. bakery not to claim foods contain allergens when they don't

#356

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course, everything weird and whacky about the US can be explained because it’s just so much bigger - you wouldn’t understand coming from such a tiny country.

The psychology of this comment aside, I don't think any country is so small it can't fit a massive factory in it. Unless you're writing from Vatican City, perhaps?

My point was that all countries have big factories but in the US they are somehow unable to make sure no cross contamination occurs.

It’s just impossible because US scale /s

Re: FDA warns top U.S. bakery not to claim foods contain allergens when they don't

#358

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The psychology of this comment aside, I don't think any country is so small it can't fit a massive factory in it. Unless you're writing from Vatican City, perhaps?

My point was that all countries have big factories but in the US they are somehow unable to make sure no cross contamination occurs. It’s just impossible because US scale /s

Are you saying all other countries have zero cross contamination? Can you cite that?

Re: FDA warns top U.S. bakery not to claim foods contain allergens when they don't

#359
post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>when you go to the typical grocery store almost all the baked goods will be from Bimbo regardless of the label Are those those the only brands they produce? I only recognize 3 of those brands, and I can't even be sure I've ever eaten more than one of those. Maybe they are big only in certain regions?

> Are those those the only brands they produce? No, the five brands explicitly marked as a non-exhaustive list (with “such as”) are not, even close to, all of their brands. https://www.bimbobakeriesusa.com/our-brands

This reminds me of Georgia Pacific or JAB (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/JAB_Holding_Company)

You walk down the aisle and think there's 4 or 5 companies in say, paper towels, competing for your business but it's probably just 1 with different brands.

Last time I checked, Whole Foods where I am carried Peet's, Stumptown, Intelligentsia and Keurig coffee, which is all just a single company. Probably comes in on the same truck.

All you gotta do is literally just have different printed labels on things, Look at sunscreen and cough medicine next time you go in.

Re: FDA warns top U.S. bakery not to claim foods contain allergens when they don't

#360

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The article says that is precisely what they did and the FDA found that it violated the spirit of the law.

Or admit the law that was being applied was actually 'the law of unintended consequences'.

The class of the anointed will never be able to admit to themselves their hubris.
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