Love is infamously hard to define. But according to the man, it is absolutely not an ingredient.
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The US Food and Drug Administration has come down on West Concord, Massachusetts-based Nashoba Brook Bakery, warning it to remove “Love” from the ingredients list on Nashoba Granola, Bloomberg reported.
In a letter to the bakery, the FDA wrote that it had seen “serious violations” of manufacturing standards for products during a tour, with “insanitary conditions in your facility at the time of the inspection”, including cross-contamination of allergens, debris caked on surfaces, and insects in the production facility. But Nashoba Chief Executive Officer John Gates told Bloomberg those observations were helpful, whereas said the agency’s intervention on the matter of love “just felt so George Orwell”.
“I really like that we list ‘love’ in the granola,” Gates told Bloomberg.
“People ask us what makes it so good,” he added. “It’s kind of nice that this artisan bakery can say there’s love in it and it puts a smile on people’s face. 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.”
The FDA is of course technically correct that “Love” is not a food product, and that letting some companies get cutesy about regulatory requirements on the nutritional value of food could ultimately dilute the system that keeps us all safe.
Of course, there are multiple good reasons one might want “Love” listed if it is indeed an ingredient in the production of Nashoba Granola. For one, more than a few of us are highly allergic to love — with possible side effects including everything from short-term psychological trauma to irreversible bad decisions such as having children. On the other hand, some might justifiably want love to discover them rather than the other way around. A few crazy people might even want to search for their own love, rather than let some company dictate the terms to them.
I, personally, just want y’all keep your cooties out of my granola.