By REUTERS
Published: June 21, 2006
Filed at 12:30 p.m. ET

BOSTON (Reuters) – When it comes to food, Boston is best known for baked beans and clam chowder. But this week, state legislators have engaged in robust debate on Marshmallow Fluff — a locally made, sugary spread.

State Sen. Jarrett Barrios started the tempest in a lunch box when he learned that his son’s Cambridge grammar school cafeteria offered Fluff-and-peanut butter sandwiches daily.

In a nation where child obesity rates have more than doubled in the past 25 years, Barrios fretted that was not a healthy option. On Monday he proposed a law that would allow schools to serve the “Fluffernutters” only once a week.

“The key was to start a discussion of what is nutritious,” said Colin Durrant, Barrios’ director of public policy.

Fluff aficionados defended the sweet spread, which locals also lather on ice cream and into hot chocolate, and is made by local company, Durkee-Mower Inc. of Lynn, Massachusetts. A two-tablespoon serving of fluff, which is made from corn syrup, sugar and egg whites, has about 60 calories.

State Rep. Kathi Anne Reinstein on Tuesday introduced a bill that would make the Fluffernutter the state sandwich. Barrios signed on as a co-sponsor of that bill, saying that he liked Fluff himself but did not want kids eating it every day for lunch.

Don Durkee, the 80-year-old president of Durkee-Mower, said Fluff didn’t warrant so much legislative attention.

“It should be up to the consumers and the parents to determine what is fed to their children,” Durkee said. “There’s probably more serious things to be concerned about.”

A Political Kerfuffle Over Marshmallow Fluff

By KATIE ZEZIMA
Published: June 21, 2006
BOSTON, June 20 — Peanut butter and Marshmallow Fluff sandwiches have created a sticky situation in the Massachusetts legislature.

The fuss over Fluffernutters, as the sandwiches are known, began when State Senator Jarrett T. Barrios’s son asked him to buy Marshmallow Fluff after eating it in his elementary school cafeteria, The Boston Globe reported Monday. Displeased, Mr. Barrios said he planned to file an amendment to a school nutrition bill to restrict schools from serving Fluff.

The concoction, made of corn syrup, sugar syrup, egg whites and vanilla, has been made in Massachusetts since 1920 and is mainly consumed in New England. In response to Mr. Barrios, two legislators who represent Lynn, the home of Fluff’s manufacturer, Durkee-Mower, filed legislation Tuesday to make the Fluffernutter the official state sandwich.

“We grew up on Fluff,” said Representative Kathi-Anne Reinstein of Revere, one of the legislators petitioning for the Fluffernutter.

Ms. Reinstein said the legislature had better things to do than to debate a sandwich spread. “With all the stuff we’re trying to do,” she said, “now you’re attacking a local business, taking it out on Fluff.”

Officials for Cambridge Public Schools, where Mr. Barrios’s son is a student, said that Fluffernutters met their nutritional guidelines and that unless the legislation passed, they had no plans to stop serving them. Mr. Barrios did not return a call for comment.

Donald Durkee, president of Durkee-Mower, said it was funny that Fluff had originated in Somerville, in Mr. Barrios’s district. But Mr. Durkee said he did not have hard feelings. “I’m flattered that he’s zeroing in on us,” he said.