Tennessee Home Kitchens Need No Permit, and Since 2025 May Sell Perishable Food

The act was created by 2022 Public Chapter 862, Senate Bill 693, which passed on March 28, 2022 and took effect July 1, 2022. It added definitions to T.C.A. § 53-1-102 and a new operating section now codified at § 53-1-118. "Homemade food item" means a food item, including a non-alcoholic beverage, which is produced and, if packaged, packaged at the private residence of the producer. "Produce" is defined broadly as preparing a food item by cooking, baking, drying, mixing, cutting, fermenting, preserving, dehydrating, growing, raising, or other process, so cooking a dish to order is squarely within the definition. "Non-time/temperature control for safety food" is defined by reference to Rules of the Tennessee Department of Agriculture, Rule 0080-04-09-.01(116). There is no revenue ceiling, no cap on employees, no kitchen inspection and no annual registration anywhere in the section.

Subsection (a) is the operative exemption: notwithstanding Part 2 of Chapter 1 or any other law, production and sale of homemade food items is exempt from all licensing, permitting, inspecting, packaging and labeling laws of this state, except when the Department of Health is investigating a reported foodborne illness. Subsection (d) preempts county, municipal and other political jurisdictions from prohibiting and regulating the production and sale of homemade food items, which is why a Metro Nashville or Knox County ordinance cannot add a home kitchen permit on top. The Tennessee Department of Agriculture confirms on its Food Freedom Act page that it does not issue permits or licenses and does not conduct inspections for products made under this law.

The exemption is conditional, and the conditions differ by food type. For shelf-stable, non-time/temperature control items, § 53-1-118(b)(1) and (b)(2) allow the widest trade: the producer may sell to the consumer in person or remotely, including by telephone or internet, or through an agent or a third-party vendor such as a retail shop or grocery store, and delivery may be made by the producer, an agent, a third-party vendor or a third-party carrier. That is broader than a classic cottage food law, which usually forbids wholesale and shipping.

The 2025 change is what brings genuine meals into range. 2025 Public Chapter 431, Senate Bill 484, passed April 21, 2025 and took effect July 1, 2025, inserting a new § 53-1-118(b)(3) and renumbering the old labeling subdivisions to (b)(4) and (b)(5). The new subdivision permits time and temperature control for safety homemade food items, the perishable category, on three conditions. They must not include unpasteurized milk or foods that are, or that contain, alcoholic beverages, fish, shellfish products, meat, meat byproducts, or meat food products. They may be sold only to the extent permissible by federal law, with poultry allowed where the home-based food business operates under the 1,000-poultry exemption in 9 CFR 381.10(c) using only exempted poultry products, or complies with 9 CFR 381.10(d) using only federally or state-inspected and passed poultry bearing the official mark of inspection. And they must be sold either by the producer to the consumer in person, or by an agent of the producer in person, such as a farm stand located on the property where the food was prepared. Internet ordering with shipping, third-party delivery apps and grocery resale are all off the table for perishable items, even though they remain open for shelf-stable ones.

Labeling is the one formality that survives the exemption. Under § 53-1-118(b)(4) the consumer must be given the producer's name, home address and telephone number, the common or usual name of the item, the ingredients in descending order of predominance, and the statement "This product was produced at a private residence that is exempt from state licensing and inspection. This product may contain allergens." Subdivision (b)(5) sets the format: on a label affixed to the package if packaged, on a label affixed to the container if sold from bulk, on a placard at the point of sale if neither, or on the webpage if the item is offered only online. For telephone and custom orders the seller need not display the information but must disclose that the item was produced at a private residence exempt from state licensing and inspection and may contain allergens, and must keep the producer, product and ingredient details readily available and provide them on request.

Four limits in subsection (c) are easy to miss. The act does not impede a Department of Health foodborne illness investigation, does not preclude selling food items otherwise authorized by law, does not change the regulation of other goods and services sold where homemade food is also sold, does not exempt anyone from applicable tax law, and does not apply to sales other than intrastate sales made within Tennessee. A Tennessee home cook may not ship across a state line under this act, because interstate sales fall back under federal and receiving-state law.

Because the Food Freedom Act works by exemption rather than by permit, there is no license to lose and no routine inspection to fail. Enforcement comes from three directions. First, if the conditions in subsection (b) are not met, the exemption does not apply and the ordinary Tennessee food law applies instead: 2022 Public Chapter 862 amended § 53-1-204(a)(1) to read that except as provided in the new section, a person shall not manufacture, so selling perishable food containing meat or fish from a home kitchen, or selling perishable food by mail order, puts the seller back under the state manufacturing and licensing rules rather than into a special penalty.

Second, the Department of Health retains full authority to investigate a reported foodborne illness, and subsection (a) expressly carves that out of the exemption, so the home kitchen is not immune from being inspected in an outbreak. Third, ordinary consumer and tort liability is untouched, and the mandatory disclosure that the food was produced at a private residence exempt from state licensing and inspection is exactly the sort of statement a plaintiff will point to. The Tennessee Department of Agriculture states that it does not issue permits, licenses or inspections under the act and cannot advise a business about its specific product, so a producer with a borderline product has no agency ruling to rely on.

Local governments cannot fill the gap: § 53-1-118(d) preempts counties, municipalities and other political jurisdictions from prohibiting and regulating homemade food items, although zoning, fire and building rules on operating a business at a residence are separate bodies of law that the act does not address.