h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

So, in preparation for making my annual batch of what these people http://www.somethingspecialdeli.com/ call 'antipasto' (although a rather tasty melange of tuna, brassica, tomato, etc. is never what I would have thought of as 'antipasto') I purchased a bottle of Mezzetta Coctail Onions http://www.mezzetta.com/mm5/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Store_Code=mezzetta&Product_Code=10100107&Category_Code=cappetizer . 'Product of Canada' the label said.

But, the label also said:

'In the Napa Valley'

'Imported'

and

'Prepared by etc. G. L. Mezzetta, etc. USA, etc.'


What gives? Weren't the new rules supposed to come in December 31? What the Hell does 'Product of Canada' mean?


and, most importantly . . .


whence come my cocktail onions.

pickled onions MMMMmmmm

just add american cheese and you have it all

on a serious note

if they were bottled in canada, i think that would qualify as product of canada

over here we get all sorts of nonscense like genuine dutch lager brewed under licence in stoke on trentWTF????

There was a mild bit of a kerfuffle over this last year and I thought it had been pretty much sorted out with new Federal legislation. I was really surprised after said kerfuffle to see a label that said, effectively

'these onions were grown in California, specifically in the Napa Valley, by a family that has lived there for generations, and they (the onions) were put in bottles by that family (well, by illegal Mexican and Guatemalan workers), in the Napa Valley, in California, in the USA (not Canada), and then trucked north (with a load of Mexicans and Guatemalans who had discovered that the USA wasn't actually that much better than the place they'd escaped) to be sold in a chain grocery store whose head office is in Pleasanton, California, but we have such little respect for our customers that we'll tell those socialist, public health-care loving, pea-meal bacon eating igloo-dwellers that these onions are PRODUCT OF CANADA!!!!!'

I'm not too impressed.

maybe it meant the bottle they were in????

if they were prepared and trucked north, then bottled in canada, would they then count as product of canada???

When they use a word, it means precisely what they intend it to mean.

No more and no less.

There.

Your onions are part of a huge kerfluffle that has hit the advertising biz. You may have noticed an increase of ads that proclaim the Canadianess of some products? (Notably Lays potato chips). These are in response to the current law which says they can't be labelled as Canadian since they are processed in part in the US (the taters are from here). But ads are not included as labels, thus the goofy nationalistic shovel fulls.

Oddly, this law was put together to stop the practice of *reconstituting* foreign juice concentrate (for instance) with Canuck water and calling it Canuckistanian. Not that long ago we were drinking Chinese apple juice in Chinese bottles and it was dubbed Canadian. O tempora o mores.

Your onions are another matter, I suspect the bottles, vinegar and the pickling process were exclusively Canadian and fit within the new guidelines. Or it's an old bottle....

it makes me so angry!

I'm fairly certain that it was an old label:

http://www.healthycanadians.ca/media/2008-06-15_e.html

*The Government's new guidelines will require both that the contents and processing be Canadian to qualify for the Product of Canada label. For foods that are processed in Canada, but contain imported ingredients, qualified Made in Canada labels will be available such as "Made in Canada from imported ingredients."*

Although the rest of the news release seems to be an attempt to break the writer's arm by repeatedly patting themselves on the back...

Well, at least it isn't so old that the 'Best Before' date is in the past. I've got until 2012 to use the infernal things.