FDA Scolds Bakery For Declaring ‘Love’ As An Ingredient In Their Granola

Apologies to grandmas and secret recipe holders everywhere, but apparently it’s no longer okay to declare “love” as an ingredient of our food.

The FDA is cracking down on Massachusetts-based Nashoba Brook Bakery for claiming that love makes up a part of their granola. The official warning letter from the FDA reads as follows:

“Your Nashoba Granola label lists ingredient “Love”. Ingredients required to be declared on the label or labeling of food must be listed by their common or usual name [21 CFR 101.4(a)(1). “Love” is not a common or usual name of an ingredient, and is considered to be intervening material because it is not part of the common or usual name of the ingredient.”

Talk about being a killjoy.

In an interview with Bloomberg, Nashoba Brook CEO John Gates classified the FDA’s statement as Orwellian. “Situations like that where the government is telling you you can’t list ‘love’ as an ingredient, because it might be deceptive, just feels so silly,” he said.

The warning letter did contain notices of several other violations of FDA health and labeling policies, which Gates already has his business morphing into compliance for. He plans to send a letter of response in the next week.

Regardless, the FDA’s warning letter serves as a message to others: Don’t claim love to be one of your ingredients. Perhaps, instead, we could say that we put soul into our food?