Cookies of Mass Destruction




Date: 11.11.06. Igie baked a batch of German spice cookies for the relatives back in the USA. Then she added some store-bought Lebkuchen, Stollen (fruit cake), and a few of those other typically teutonic goodies we know you like. My job was to pack them up and take them to the post office. If I get them posted by mid-November, we can get several-kilo boxes off to North America in time for Christmas at the economy rate. To my surprise, the lady at the Swiss post office informed me of the following US regulations.

(The following text is copied from the US Food and Drug Administration web site at http://www.access.fda.gov)

FDA Industry Systems (FIS) was created to facilitate making submissions to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), including registrations, listings, and other notifications. FIS has been available 24 hours a day, seven days a week, since October 16, 2003 6:00 p.m. EDT.

FIS was created, in part, in response to the Bioterrorism Act of 2002, which gave high priority to improved information management to help protect the food supply. The Act requires that FDA develop two systems: one to support the registration of facilities that manufacture, process, pack, or hold food products intended for consumption in the United States and one to receive prior notice before food is imported or offered for import into the United States. Under the law, facilities must be registered by December 12, 2003 when Prior Notice went into effect.

What this means is that we can't send you packages of food over 2 kgs any more, because the US administration fears bioterrorism. Anything over 2 kgs which contains 'biological agents', such as yeast, flour, sugar, raisins, glace fruit, candied ginger, etc., must be pre-registered. We would have to open an "account" with the FDA and get our packages inspected. As I recall, the last time someone sent bioterror agents through the mail, it was a home-grown fascist sending anthrax letters. Write your congressmen: this is mass hysteria if we can't even send you home-made cookies anymore. Two grams of anthrax would do a lot more damage than five kilos of Igie's cookies.

Well, anyway, those are the rules, and the upshot is that your Christmas packages are going to be light this year. I had to repack them to get each one under 2 kgs, so I took out the Stollen. Be safe in the knowledge that your government is protecting you from rampant foreign fruit cakes. Now, I grant you that 2 kgs of Igie's spice cookies might still contribute to obesity, which constitutes a continuing and long-term threat to national security. Cookies of mass destruction. Next year you're all getting woolly sweaters.