USDA: Frozen Fries Are 'Fresh' Veggies

USDA: Frozen Fries Are 'Fresh' Veggies
by Andrew Martin LA TIMES

WASHINGTON — Anyone trying to add more fresh fruits and vegetables to their diet may have just gotten an unlikely assist from the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

Meir Stampfer, a professor of nutrition at the Harvard School of Public Health, said it "boggles the mind" that the USDA would label French fries a fresh vegetable since most commercial fries are prepared in oil laden with heart-clogging trans-fat.

...

U.S. District Judge Richard Schell <TEXAS> said the term "fresh vegetables" was ambiguous.

...

"I find it pretty outrageous, really," said Elliott, who argued that the Batter-Coating Rule is so vague that chocolate-covered cherries, packed in a candy box, would qualify as fresh fruit.

"This is something that only lawyers could do," Elliott said, pointing to a stack of legal documents debating the French fry change. "There must be 100 pages there about something you could summarize in one paragraph: Batter-coated French fries are not fresh vegetables."

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http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0615-02.htm

(want some mad cow with that?)

Looks like it's another Good News Week under Bush

The perfect vegetarian meal! Thanks to Gipper & Bonzo!

I guess if ketchup is a vegetable, a fried, batter-coated chunk of potatoe* is too.

Welcome to the continuing journey down the rabbit hole.

vegetables. I knew I was making it too hard.

After all, he said that ketchup is a veggie because it's made from tomatos...Only for purposes of USDA school lunch programs, of course...

seen on a T-shirt all those years ago.

:evilgrin:

Wow -- Jr. really IS Reagan II

Does this have any ramifications for the school lunch program? I know some states encourage (and some districts require) fresh fruit and vegetables whenever possible.

How is "fresh vegetables" ambiguous in the least? Go to the produce section of the grocery store. The piles of vegetables in the produce section? Those are fresh. The bags in the freezer? Those are frozen, and hence, not fresh.

This isn't even a case for lawyers -- this is a case for kindergarteners. Show any five-year-old a carrot, a tomato, a cucumber and a bag of Ore-Ida crinkle cuts, and, even with the cuts to school health and nutrition programs, I bet she'll quickly notice that one of these things is not like the others.

n/t

Take that mom!

I AM eating my vegetables. :D

Up is down
War is Peace
Slavery is Freedom
Ignornace is Strength
You want some fresh veggies with that McBurger.

To be quite honest, NOTHING Bunnypants* and the Imperial Family do, could surprise me in the least, up to and inclduing rounding us up and shipping us to Arizona Gulags.

french fry producers to be included in one of the myriad archaic agricultural subsidies.

that has gone bonkers under the twit administration…..we live in interesting times….

Sid

are sometimes fresher than fresh vegetables that have been sitting around for days. Potatoes are technically "vegetable," but they are really a very starchy vegetable, more closely related to white bread in food value than to broccoli or strawberries. For the purposes of a healthy diet, I don't even think a baked "fresh" potato should be classified as a vegetable.

I should know. I was recently diagnosed with Type 2 Diabetes. Fortunately I don't need medication. I can keep my blood sugar levels normal through diet and exercise.

However there's nothing that will raise my blood glucose better than potatoes particularly those without the skin. I've never had batter fried potatoes but I imagine those are even worse.

With obesity reaching record levels in this country there are cases where teenagers are being diagnosed with Type 2 Diabetes. (I have a month and half till my 47th birthday) If the Bush assholes have their way things will get even worse.

The food industry has their best interests a heart not yours.

We all know what fresh vegetables and fruit are. It's what you get in the produce isle not the frozen food case. If it's processed it isn't fresh.

Even the fresh produce can be frankenfood and treated with chemicals to make it look good and retard spoilage.

Best bet is to grow your own which isn't practical.

The story is also in USATODAY..


Batter-coated french fries now a fresh vegetable on USDA list
WASHINGTON (AP) — Batter-coated french fries are a fresh vegetable, according to the Agriculture Department, which has a federal judge's ruling to back it up.
But the department said Tuesday that the classification applies only to rules of commerce, not nutrition, and it doesn't consider an order of fries the same as an apple in school lunches.

The ruling last week by federal District Judge Richard Schell in Beaumont, Texas, allowed batter-coated french fries to be considered fresh vegetables under the Perishable Agricultural Commodities Act. Most other frozen fries had been on the list since 1996.

Regulations under the law help to assure buyers of commodities such as french fries that they are getting what they ordered, said George Chartier, a spokesman for the department's Agricultural Marketing Service. Frozen fries are fresh simply because they don't meet the standard necessary for them to be listed as processed, and adding batter to the fries does not change the classification, he said.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2004-06-15-fries_x.htm