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Originally Posted by veggielover  I have some delicious and healthy recipes for various ethnic foods. Do I need a license to cook them at home and sell to co-workers? Do they have to be "FDA approved" ? How about if I wanted to buy a commercial kitchen and mass produce the food, do I need additional licenses? Last, how would I go about getting supermarkets to stock my foods? Also who would be liable should someone get sick from eating my food? |
As Garantee mentioned, in the U.S., there is a complicated tapestry of local (city and county), state and federal regulations that get woven together. Not only is your location important but so is the type of food you're thinking of selling (e.g., jams as opposed to salumis) may be well subject to different regulations as well where you intend to sell your products.
I used to own a food store in California and the local regulations not only prohibited preparing food for public consumption in homes but also on home equipment. That being said, there were many food makers who started under the radar from their homes but were taking a big legal gamble. Most of the people that I know who chose this route at least had a great deal of prior food safety/commercial food preparation experience so they could rationalize the gamble and minimize their potential liability somewhat.
I would first suggest you consult your local health department as a starting point as well as learning about food safety issues and the safe preparation of food. In my county, the local health department hosts food safety classes, so it's a great starting point.
To make matters even more fun, the labelling requirements will depend on the size and type of your packaging and will be influenced by where you intend to sell your product.
Ultimately, the person who prepares the food is liable for any claims arising from eating the food. I say "ultimately" because even if I were to file a claim against the store I bought my food at, the store's own insurance company would most likely go after the producer's insurance policy (what the insurance companies call "subrogation").
Have fun!