Pretty Nutty

I'm sure by now we have all heard about the restrictions in American Schools regarding foods with nuts in em. This post will not go into the history, medical research or any opinions one way or the other about the topic. The point of this post is only to notify the public of my findings. This is a tale of two boxes.

My kids are in nut free schools and we follow the rules, period. If we send them with homemade lunches we must adhere to the list of allowable foods. If we send them with packaged snacks we must check the labels, not only for the ingredients contained within the food but also for a distinct warning about the equipment used to process that food. Since most of the parents in our area live and shop at the same stores the teachers are aware of the common snacks that are approved and prohibited from each store. As the above picture already told you, this post is about Chewy Chocolate Chip Granola Bars. The box on the left is from Acme and the box on the right is from ShopRite. Our sons knowledgeable teacher informed us that the ShopRite bars are the only ones the kids may bring to class because the Acme bars contain the following disclaimer:



PACKAGED ON EQUIPMENT THAT PROCESSES PEANUTS, ALMONDS.

Considering one of my sons classmates actually has a nut allergy we are very respectful of the rule and cautious of what we buy. Since my kids do not have any allergies and they often eat snacks at home my wife will sometimes buy "nutty" foods that don't get sent to school. Well, that's where this got interesting. This evening my wife asked me to come to the kitchen as she was packing up some snack bags for the kids. She showed me this:



Yup, two very different boxes with identical contents!



In total fairness, the two individually wrapped bars are in slightly different packages. The Acme bar has a serial number and a QR code as well as a specification next to the words Chocolate Chip that reads "Naturally & Artificially Flavored"



Maybe they are indeed different. Maybe they are the same but made in different facilities and packaged similarly because its cheaper. I dunno, I'm just sayin...