Eat This Newsletter 247: Legal-ease
Hello
Three of today’s stories have the law behind them, and one probably should have. Enjoy!
Still crying
Marion Nestle has now weighed in on the raw milk case I mentioned last week with some very sensible observations, linking to a paywalled article in the New York Times that puts the toll so far at 171 rather than the 165 I reported last week. She also links to a piece from lawyer Bill Marler that I missed, pointing out that Raw Farm LLC is a repeat offender, and to two recent news items. One reports that a cheesemaker whose raw milk cheese killed two people got away with a fine and probation. The other that, despite the risks, most recently from avian ’flu, sales of raw milk continue to grow.
Marian Nestle’s own views?
No question, it’s risky. How risky? As with so much else in nutrition, it depends on point of view. ...
If you must drink raw milk, know your farmer, make sure the milk is fresh and comes from one cow, and use it right away. The risk goes up the more it is pooled and sits around. …
I prefer Pasteurized.
Pick-me-up
Wanted in Rome, among others, reports on the death after a long illness of Roberto ‘Loli’ Linguanotto, the man credited with the invention of tiramisù. The idea that anyone “invented” this classic of traditional Italian cuisine, “the favourite dessert of eight out of 10 Italians,” may seem preposterous, but it may even be true. The article acknowledges that while the dish appeared on the menu of Linguanotte’s restaurant in 1972, the first printed recipe dates to only 1983, a year after that other ancient traditional food, ciabatta.
Was it really invented? Wanted in Rome links to an article at the Accademia del Tiramisù. This offers a somewhat coy version of the dish’s history. “It is said that this dessert was invented by a clever ‘maitresse’ of a house of pleasure in the centre of Treviso,” who “developed this aphrodisiac dessert to offer to customers at the end of the evening in order to reinvigorate them and solve the problems they may have had with their conjugal duties on their return to their wives.”
Illustrated, bizarrely, by the sculpture Modesty (or Chastity, La Pudicizia) by Antonio Corradini, the article continues with sparse details of grandmothers who recalled loving the stuff and farmers who concocted a “restorative for newlyweds” of sugar and egg yolks. In the end, though, it concludes with this:
As often happens in legends, there are various elements of truth: Tiramisù originates from Treviso, in Italy.
I’m honestly not sure how to interpret that. Is it an admission that the preceding text is mostly tosh? Or is it rather that the only incontestable fact in the article is that tiramisù originated in Treviso?
One person who might know more is Alberto Grandi, who arouses the ire of Italians by pointing out that their cherished beliefs about their culinary traditions often have no foundation in history. He was a judge in the 2023 Tiramisù World Championships, but seems to have been too polite to reflect on the dish’s history.
I should note too that the Italian version of the page, has a lot more information and, for the observant, a truly aberrant text, er, insertion. Spot it if you can.
Inflated Bread
In Canada, a long-running legal case is nearing its end. For 14 years, it was alleged, large Canadian supermarket companies conspired to fix and artificially inflate the price of bread. Now Loblaws and its parent company Westons have agreed to pay $500 million to settle their part of the case.
The news is significant for two reasons. Not only is this the largest antitrust settlement in Canadian history, it is also probably lower than it might have been had the case against Loblaws and Weston gone to court, because they cooperated with the investigation in exchange for immunity from prosecution.
Other companies named in the case deny their involvement and will go to trial in the coming months. Unless they settle first.
p.s. Weston has form; see How great Canadian wheat ruined industrial bread.
Winging It
My thanks to the Supreme Court of Ohio for the past week’s finest food laugh. Chicken wings advertised as ‘boneless’ can have bones, Ohio Supreme Court decides.
“A diner reading ‘boneless wings’ on a menu would no more believe that the restaurant was warranting the absence of bones in the items than believe that the items were made from chicken wings, just as a person eating ‘chicken fingers’ would know that he had not been served fingers,” Justice Joseph T. Deters wrote for the majority.
A legal scholar to reckon with, clearly.
The three dissenting justices, however, described the judge’s reasoning as “utter jabberwocky”.
“The question must be asked: Does anyone really believe that the parents in this country who feed their young children boneless wings or chicken tenders or chicken nuggets or chicken fingers expect bones to be in the chicken? Of course they don’t,” Justice Michael P. Donnelly wrote in dissent. “When they read the word ‘boneless,’ they think that it means ‘without bones,’ as do all sensible people.”
Personally, I’m more concerned about labelling a bit of breast meat wing, but that’s just me.
Take care
