Spiced or not, novel food is novel food

Abstract (English)

Culinary herbs and spices have been integral to human cooking practice for centuries, adding flavor, appearance, sustainability, and health benefits to dishes worldwide. However, their specific consistency (powder or finely chopped leaves, seeds or fruits) makes their correct identification difficult as well as detecting the co-presence of other materials, some of which can be categorized as novel food. Novel food refers to food that has not been widely consumed within the European Union before the 15th May 1997, and is therefore subject to pre-market registration and approval requirements. This category includes food obtained by new or innovative processing technologies, ingredients or sources such as certain animals, plants, fungi, algae etc. making it new to the market [1]. The EU Rapid Alert System for Food and Feed (RASFF) was used as a source of data related to the violations of novel food regulations [2]. A total of 32 notifications were reported during the period 2011-2024, with the majority in 2023 (11 cases as opposed to 21 recorded in other years), were mostly the result of border and market controls (62.5 and 34.4%, respectively). Three consignments with fenugreek leaves (Trigonella foenum graecum), two each with stevia leaves (Stevia rebaudiana), hemp (Cannabis sativa) and female ginseng (Angelica sinensis) and one each with avocado leaves (Persea americana), Asplenium ceterach, mate yerba (Minthostachys verticillata), Japanese pepper (Zanthoxylum piperitum), Kratom (Mitragyna speciosa), Indian gooseberry or amla (Emblica officinalis), Myristica fatua, Boldo (Peumus boldus), Dzhondzholi (Colchis bladdernut), Monk fruit (Siraitia grosvenorii), bitter leaves (Vernonia amygdalina), perilla leaves (Perilla frutescens), olive leaves (Olea europaea), rue (Ruta graveolens), Codonopsis pilosula, kava (Piper methysticum) extract, Mucuna pruriens extract, Job's tears (Coix lacryma-jobi), marshmallow flower (Althaea officinalis), clove leaf (Syzygium aromaticum), Angelica dahurica, Pandanus amaryllifolius Roxb. and Clitoria ternatea, some mixed into spices/spice blends (21.9%) and some as plant material, mostly originated from China (21.9%), but also from India, Argentina, etc. Although for majority of notifications the extent of health risk could not be decided (56.2%) or considered as potential risk (34.4%), more than half resulted in border rejections (56.2%). Despite the rather small amounts used in food preparation, either in the case of spice(s) mixed with novel ingredient(s) or pure novel food on its own, it is important to consider that some of the identified herbs contain compounds with potent pharmacological action and should not be unintentionally ingested with or instead of culinary herbs and spices.