New Hampshire calls a home food business a homestead food operation, under RSA 143-A:12. Food that isn't potentially hazardous, made in the kitchen of your primary residence, is exempt from licensing and inspection when you sell it from your home, your own farm stand, a farmers market, or a retail food store. Selling online, by mail order, to restaurants or to wholesalers takes a homestead food license from the Department of Health and Human Services, and so does selling freeze-dried fruit and vegetables. The current label rules let packages sold from home or a farm stand point to a QR code or website for ingredients, with a sign at the display. Every product carries one of two statements, exempt or licensed. In the example below, a Keene maker sorts six products. Below are the rules, the label, the example, and a free checklist.
The short version
- Homestead food: anything not potentially hazardous, made in your primary residence's kitchen or a food production area there.
- Exempt from license and inspection when sold from home, your farm stand, farmers markets, or retail food stores.
- A homestead food license for restaurants and other food establishments, internet sales, mail order, and wholesalers.
- Freeze-dried foods need a license even at exempt venues.
- No potentially hazardous food, including low-acid canned foods.
- Label: name, address or email, phone, product, ingredients, allergy information, and the exempt or licensed statement.
- From home or a farm stand, ingredients can sit behind a QR code or website, with a sign at the display.
- TaroStack keeps each batch's lot and which stores it went to. More below.
The rules
| Rule | What RSA 143-A:12 says |
|---|---|
| Homestead food operation | Produces homestead food products, not potentially hazardous, in the home kitchen or a food production area of the primary residence |
| The area | Handwashing, safe equipment and food storage, cleanable surfaces, general sanitation, pets excluded during production |
| Equipment | Commercial kitchen equipment allowed if it can be cleaned and sanitized there |
| Exempt venues | The homestead residence, your own farm stand, farmers markets, retail food stores |
| Licensed venues | Restaurants and other retail food establishments, the internet, mail order, wholesalers, brokers and distributors |
| Freeze-dried foods | Fruits, vegetables and commercially prepared dairy, freeze-dried, need a license |
| Inspection | Exempt operations only when the department suspects an imminent health hazard |
The law is RSA 143-A:12, amended several times in 2025, most recently effective November 12, 2025, and DHHS's rule He-P 2300 defines homestead food products further. This is general information, not legal advice.
The label
| Line | What it says |
|---|---|
| Operation | Name, physical or email address, and phone number |
| Product | The name of the product |
| Ingredients | In descending order by weight |
| Allergens | Allergy information |
| Exempt statement | "This product is exempt from New Hampshire licensing and inspection." |
| Licensed statement | "This product is made in a residential food production area licensed by the New Hampshire Department of Health and Human Services." |
For packages sold from your home or farm stand, the label can instead give a QR code or website listing the ingredients, with a sign at the display that lists them too. Packages sold at farmers markets, to stores, online or wholesale carry the full ingredient list. How to work out the allergens in a recipe is in allergen matrix template.
An example: a Keene maker
Monadnock Kitchen, a made-up homestead food operation in Keene, New Hampshire, I use in these examples, sells at a farm stand, a farmers market and a general store:
| Product | Allowed? | How |
|---|---|---|
| Maple sugar candy | Yes | Exempt |
| Double-crust apple pie | Yes | Exempt |
| Cookies at a general store | Yes | Retail food stores are exempt venues |
| Cookies sold online and mailed | License | Internet and mail order need a license |
| Freeze-dried strawberries | License | Freeze-dried foods need one |
| Cheesecake | No | Potentially hazardous |
The farm stand labels point to a QR code for ingredients, with a printed sign beside the shelf; the market and store packages carry the full list. Maple season lifts March: by September Monadnock Kitchen had sold $25,200. How a home food business starts is in how to start a cottage food business, and which foods are potentially hazardous in TCS foods list.
Get the checklist
Download the New Hampshire homestead food checklist. Three sheets: the label, each line with a column for yours; products, each with whether it's allowed and how; and sales by month. It's an ordinary Excel file with no macros, and it works in Google Sheets, LibreOffice and Numbers.
Where this stops working
A farm stand, a farmers market and a store each need a different label, and the store will ask which batch it got. Keep the QR-code ingredient list and the jar's real recipe in step, and know where each batch went.
How TaroStack does it
TaroStack keeps each batch's lot and which stores it went to.
Each batch dated. A batch of candy or pies gets a lot with its production and best-before dates, and lot labels print with it.
Recipes by version. Each recipe is versioned, so when an ingredient changes, the new version has a date, and the ingredient list behind the QR code can be updated the same day.
The store as a customer. The general store has its own orders, and each order records the lots it got, so one recall report shows every store and customer a batch reached.
| The job | Notebook | In TaroStack |
|---|---|---|
| A batch's date | Written on the box | The batch's lot and dates |
| When a recipe changed | Remembered | A recipe version on a date |
| Which batch the store got | Not recorded | Recorded with each order |
Lots, batches, versioned recipes and orders are on every plan, from $49 a month. The first 30 days are free, with no credit card. If you'd like a hand setting up, ask, and we'll do it with you.