David Crabill

Actually none of these items would be allowed — sorry.

Probably the only way would be to propose an amendment in the next legislative session.

It is a strange restricted they’ve added to the law, and I don’t know exactly how the health dept interprets it, but this is how I interpret it:

• You cannot put any kind of fresh fruit in baked goods, so banana bread or an apple pie from fresh apples would not be allowed.
• You can use canned fruit, so a cherry pie with canned cherries would be fine.
• You can use packaged frozen fruit.
• You can use dehydrated fruit if you are not the one dehydrating it.
• If you do use fruit, it must be baked into the product — it cannot go on top.

Basically, you cannot be the one handling the fruit to prepare it. You cannot be cutting apples or peeling bananas. The fruit prep must take place in an inspected facility, so if you buy the fruit already prepared in the form that you need it, that’s okay.

I’m not really sure why they did this. All I can think is that they want the fruit to be coming from an approved source and they have safety concerns. It really doesn’t make sense to me and there isn’t any other state that has this rule.

Margie, setting up a commercial kitchen in your home is definitely complicated and not many people do it. However, if you can’t get access to another commercial kitchen, or if working out of your home is a must, then putting a commercial kitchen in your home will be the only way to have an unrestricted food business.

A cottage food operation sounds like it might almost be too limited for you, given that you’ve already given consideration to do all that to your kitchen. As you may know, the cottage food law is different for each county in MO, and one may not even exist in yours. You need to check with the health department.

Without knowing the specifics about your cottage food law, I can tell you that most only let you make food from your home kitchen (making food from any other kitchen would not be allowed). You’d also be limited to non-potentially hazardous foods at the most, you won’t be able to make items that need to be refrigerated. A cottage food operation is a registered business and you can advertise however you want, but all your sales would probably need to be direct (in-person). So while would could sell at a school, you couldn’t sell to a school where they would resell the food. If you’re talking about a school fundraiser, then you should know that most states provide an exemption for religious and charitable events where no license is needed.

You mean inter-county sales within the state? Yes, that’s fine.