Apple Butter Jar Labeling Commission Seizes 60 Jars Mislabeled ‘Homemade’ at Farmers Market

PRESERVE JUNCTION — The Apple Butter Jar Labeling Commission seized 60 jars at the Saturday farmers market after determining they were labeled “homemade” but produced in a commercial kitchen 40 miles away, “a facility with a loading dock and a forklift, which is not a home by any definition we recognize,” said commission chair Dorothy Vane.

Under the state’s Cottage Food Truth in Labeling Act, “homemade” may only appear on foods produced in a residential kitchen by the seller or their immediate family. “Small batch” requires batches under 50 jars. “Grandma’s recipe” requires a grandma, “verified by affidavit if necessary,” Vane said. The seized jars bore all three claims; investigators found the grandma in question “was a stock photo.”

The vendor, who asked to be identified only as “Kettle Creek Provisions,” argued the recipe was genuinely his grandmother’s. “The recipe is homemade. The location is commercial. The label says homemade, which refers to the recipe’s spirit,” he said, in a defense Vane described as “poetic and legally weightless.”

The commission’s lab also flagged 14 jars for “consistency deviation” — apple butter, by regulation, must coat the back of a spoon without running. “Three of the seized jars were, texturally, applesauce with ambitions,” said inspector Ray Pullman, who demonstrated the spoon test for reporters with “the gravity of a man who has done this 4,000 times.”

The jars will be held as evidence until the vendor completes a labeling compliance course or “until apple butter season ends, whichever comes first — and apple butter season, legally, never ends.”

Pullman’s spoon test — the demonstration he performed for reporters “with the gravity of a man who has done this 4,000 times” — has its own training video, required viewing for new inspectors. The 12-minute film covers spoon angle (45 degrees), observation time (10 seconds), and the three approved verdicts: “butter,” “ambitious sauce,” and “please step aside.” Pullman’s personal record: 212 spoon tests in a single market day. “My wrist was sore for a week,” he said. “Worth it. The people deserve butter.”

The “grandma affidavit” process — required when a vendor claims “Grandma’s recipe” — involves a one-page form, a signature, and, Vane said, “an honor system we take extremely seriously.” Kettle Creek Provisions has 30 days to either produce a qualifying grandma or rebrand; the owner says he’s considering “Forklift Kitchen Provisions,” which Vane called “honest, industrial, and — I checked — not a home, so the ‘homemade’ problem solves itself.” The seized jars, meanwhile, sit in the commission’s evidence pantry, where Pullman admitted “the smell of cinnamon is constant, and morale is high.”