Can Chocolate-Covered Cherries Be Far Behind?

Do you remember when in 1981 during Ronald Reagan's administration ketchup came close to being designated as a vegetable? Last week a federal judge in Texas, U.S. District Judge Richard Schell, did a little favor for the french-fry industry at the industry's request, of course. He endorsed a change in the federal regulations that govern the definition of fresh vegetables. Tim Elliot, a Chicago attorney who recently challenged the revision said the new designation defies common sense. He said that the regulations are so vague that chocolate-covered cherries packed in a candy box would qualify as fresh fruit.

The french-fry industry has spent the last 50 years trying to get revisions made to the Perishable Agricultural Commodities Act (PACA). This law was passed in 1930 to protect fruit and vegetable farmers in case their customers went out of business without paying for their produce.

This latest deliberation, initiated by the Frozen Potato Products Institute, sought to add batter-coated frozen french fries to the list of fresh produce. Other kinds of frozen fries have been on the list since 1996. The institute argued that rolling potato slices in a starch coating, frying them, and freezing them is the same as waxing a cucumber or sweetening a strawberry.

So we've wasted hours and hours of time on a perfectly ridiculous idea. Meir Stampfer, a professor of nutrition at Harvard, says it best: Nutritional advice should be moved out of the USDA office. Of course, some feel that the change had more to do with money than healthy eating. Shocking!

To see the Chicago Tribune article, click on the title of this blog.