00:00Welcome to Truth and Trends. Today, Charles and I are taking a fun, deep dive into a topic
00:12that we all love, food. But we're not talking about recipes. We're talking about the bizarre
00:17and surprising history of America's food and drug laws.
00:20It's a fascinating topic, Sophia. I found out that the FDA was created largely because
00:25of muckraking journalists who exposed some truly disgusting and unsanitary food practices in the
00:31early 1900s. Yes, the book The Jungle by Upton Sinclair, which exposed the meatpacking industry,
00:37was a huge factor. It led to the passage of the Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906. And it's a good
00:42reminder that a lot of the things we take for granted today, like clean food, were a hard-fought
00:46battle. And it's also a reminder that some of the laws that came out of that era are still on the
00:52books. Like in Wisconsin, where I have limited knowledge on this, but I believe there are still
00:57regulations on what can be called cheese. You're right. Wisconsin has some of the most strict cheese
01:02laws in the country. They have a very specific set of standards for what a legal cheese is.
01:06It's an example of a law that was created to protect consumers from fraud, but it's still being
01:11enforced today. So if you're in Wisconsin, you want to make sure you're getting a legal cheese.
01:15And did you know that there's a federal standard of identity for mayonnaise? It has to contain at least
01:1965% vegetable oil by weight. That's hilarious. And what about butter? I've always heard that some
01:24of the stuff we eat isn't real butter. You're right. There's a lot of legal wrangling over what
01:28can be called butter. In a lot of states, butter has to be made from cream. And there are laws about
01:33what color you can dye it. And it's not just food. I found out that during the prohibition era,
01:37the government had to regulate what kind of grapes could be sold. Because people were using them to make
01:42wine at home. That's a great little known fact. It just shows how creative people are when they want
01:46something they can't have. And it also shows how complicated our laws can get. It's a reminder
01:51that a lot of these laws were created for a reason. But they've just stuck around. So Charles,
01:56it feels like we've covered the bizarre and the surprising. It's a good reminder of how much our
02:00food and our laws have changed over the last century. It is. It's a fun, little known part of
02:04American history. Thanks for being with us. My pleasure. Well, that's all the time we have for today.
02:09We hope you've enjoyed this look into the quirky world of food and law. We sure have. And we'll see you next time.
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