That Time the European Union Tried to Ban Cinnamon Buns

As more information is revealed about the extent of European Union regulatory inanity in the wake of the #Brexit victory, the more the Leave voters have been vindicated.

Kemberlee blogged that EU regulations were set to ban traditional tea kettles and toasters that are essential appliances in the British kitchen. In 2013, the bureaucrats put restrictions on cinnamon content of traditional Danish pastries:

Brussels has sparked outrage in Denmark by proposing to outlaw their traditional pastries.Christmas festivities have been dampened in Copenhagen by the prospect that this could be the last year its citizens will be able to eat their kanelsnegler or cinnamon rolls.The end to the beloved pastries comes from EU limits on the amount of coumarin, a naturally occurring toxic chemical found in the most commonly used type of cinnamon, cassia.

I would now like to conduct the chemical risk assessment that Brussels has obviously failed to do:

So, here are the rules that Brussels set-up that impact Danish Christmas kanelsnegle or cinnamon rolls:

Under Danish interpretation of the EU legislation the amount of cinnamon in “everyday fine baked goods” will be limited to 15mg per kilo meaning a ban on Kanelsnegler pastries, a winter favourite in all Nordic countries, which take their name from their coiled snail shape.The move has provoked a furious reaction from Danish bakers because neighbouring Sweden has decided to save their spicy pastries, known as Kanelbullar in Swedish, by classing them as a traditional and seasonal dish with a permitted cinnamon level over three times higher, at 50mg per kilo.”It’s the end of the cinnamon roll as we know it,” said Hardy Christensen, the head of the Danish Baker’s Association.

Let’s process this data for for a few minutes. We will assume that some eats the pastry that is 50 mg of cinnamon per kilogram of pastry and each pastry is about 3 ounces in weight.

A person would have to eat 12 of the higher content cinnamon rolls to hit the 50 mg levels. A person would have to eat over 3000 to achieve the 15,000 mg that is the theoretical legal dose.

Holy Kanelsnegler, Batman!

A proponent of #Brexit states the obvious:

“An average person would have to eat so many Danish pastries in order to be affected, they would certainly die of obesity before being hurt by a low level of cinnamon,” Paul Nuttall, the deputy leader of Ukip, told Telegraph.com. “We don’t need the nanny state or the EU to tell us what do and certainly not how many Danish pastries we should eat for Christmas.”

Intriguingly, there are reports that regular consumption of cinnamon may actually reduce blood pressure.

So does leaving behemoth bureaucracies.

The leader of the far-right Danish People’s Party says Denmark should now follow Britain’s lead and hold a referendum on its membership.Party leader Kristian Thulesen Dahls said if the Danish parliament cannot agree on reforms with the EU a referendum could give Denmark a new opportunity.

Danes were able to find a way around the spicy ban by simply reclassifying their beloved pastry:

Eurosceptic politicians cited the threatened bun ban as an example of EU meddling, and Danish media have dubbed the contentious issue “cinnamon-gate”.But on Monday the Danish Bakers’ Association announced it had found a way around the EU limit of 15 milligrams of per kilogram of pastry — reclassifying cinnamon rolls as a traditional or seasonal food consumed only occasionally.”After around six months’ work we have agreed that the cinnamon roll and similar products are (considered) traditional Danish pastries and as such can contain up to 50 milligrams per kilogram of finished product,” it said.

(Featured Image from Allrecipes.com Video)

Tags: BREXIT, European Union

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