Last verified: October 23, 2026. I’m a Texas home baker, not a lawyer — laws change, so always confirm with the New Mexico Environment Department (NMED) before you sell.

NEW MEXICO HOMEMADE FOOD AT A GLANCE

Annual sales cap: None. The Homemade Food Act (NMSA 1978, §§ 25-12-1 to -3) contains no sales limit at all — sell $500 or $50,000 worth, the Act doesn’t count.

License or permit: Not required — qualifying homemade food sales are exempt from state food permitting. (NMED may offer a voluntary permit, and old pre-2021 “Homebased Food Processor” permits no longer exist.) No registration, either.

Kitchen inspection: Not required — no routine inspection. NMED enforces the Act, may investigate suspected foodborne illness, and must issue a written warning before any fine.

Food handler course: Required — this is New Mexico’s one real gate. You must complete a food handler certification course approved by the department, and Albuquerque’s health department is plain about the order: get the card before you produce food to sell.

Shipping: Allowed — the Act expressly includes internet sales and mail delivery, as long as every buyer is in New Mexico and the food travels in a sanitary, protected way.

Wholesale: Not allowed. No sales to restaurants, wholesalers, or distributors, and no sales outside New Mexico. Direct to consumers only.

NEW MEXICO’S HOMEMADE FOOD ACT: ONE CARD, NO CAP, AND THE MAIL IS OPEN

New Mexico doesn’t call it cottage food — since July 1, 2021, it’s the Homemade Food Act, and it’s one of the most generous frameworks in this whole series. No permit. No registration. No sales cap — the Act simply never sets one. You can sell at markets and festivals, from your porch, on the internet, and through the mail, all written right into the statute. Very few states put mail delivery in the law itself; New Mexico does.

There’s exactly one hoop, and it’s a sensible one: a food handler certification course, completed before you start producing. In exchange for that card, the state leaves your kitchen alone — no inspections, no permit renewals, no revenue ceiling.

The fine print lives in three places, all covered below: your food must be shelf-stable (nothing that needs refrigeration), the Albuquerque/Bernalillo County area has its own health department running the program locally, and New Mexico’s “label” is really an information duty that can ride on a package, a placard, or your webpage — with a special rule for phone orders that’s unlike any other state in this series.

WHAT YOU CAN (AND CAN’T) SELL

Everything under the Homemade Food Act must be a not time-and-temperature-control (non-TCS) food — shelf-stable, no refrigeration needed to keep it safe. The Act doesn’t print a food list; NMED and the City of Albuquerque publish examples (and both say the lists aren’t exhaustive):

Allowed examples: Baked goods that do not require refrigeration — cakes, cookies, bread, pies, pastries; candy; popcorn and popcorn balls; chocolate-covered pretzels; dehydrated fruits; granola and dry mixes; roasted coffee; whole, uncut fruits and vegetables; and high-sugar fruit jams, jellies, and preserves.

The frosting question: The Act never names buttercream. The line the agencies draw is refrigeration: Albuquerque’s health department lists cakes with “glaze or frosting that requires refrigeration (e.g., cream cheese frosting)” as not allowed, and cakes or pies with cream, custard, or cheese fillings are out too. If your frosting can sit safely at room temperature, it isn’t named either way; if it needs the fridge, it’s out. Borderline recipe? Ask NMED (or Albuquerque EHD, in Bernalillo County) before you sell it.

Freeze-dried treats: The words “freeze-dried” appear nowhere in New Mexico’s official sources — but the pieces are all there. The Act’s definition of “to produce” expressly includes dehydrating, and the agencies’ allowed examples include dehydrated fruits and candy. Freeze-dried fruit fits the published dehydrated-fruit example, and freeze-dried candy fits the candy category. That’s a category fit, not a printed permission slip — for anything unusual, a quick confirmation with NMED is cheap insurance.

Not allowed (all TCS): Meat, poultry, and fish, including jerky; salsas and other acidified or low-acid canned products; canned fruits, vegetables, and pickled products; vegetable jams and jellies (hot pepper jelly is the agencies’ example); pies and cakes with fillings that require refrigeration — banana cream, pumpkin, lemon meringue, custard pies, cheesecake; milk and dairy products like cheese and yogurt; cut produce or juices; cut melons; cut tomatoes or chopped leafy greens; caramel apples (Albuquerque lists them as not allowed — the opposite of Mississippi’s rule); hummus; garlic-in-oil mixtures; sprouts; salad dressings; beverages like juices, kombucha, and cider; and anything containing CBD or alcohol.

Kitchen rules (these are in the statute, not suggestions): Produce at your private farm, ranch, or residence. Keep the kitchen sanitary, practice good hygiene, protect the kitchen from rodents and pests, and keep pets and children out of the kitchen while you’re producing. When you transport food, keep it sanitary and protected from pets, children, and other hazards.

NEW MEXICO LABELING REQUIREMENTS

New Mexico law (§ 25-12-3(C)) requires you to give the consumer four pieces of information:

  1. Your name, home address, telephone number, and email address — all four, as the processor of the food. The Act offers no ID-number substitute for the home address.
  2. The common or usual name of the food — like “Chocolate Chip Cookies.”
  3. Ingredients in descending order of predominance (most to least).
  4. This exact statement, verbatim: This product is home produced and is exempt from state licensing and inspection. This product may contain allergens.

How you deliver that information depends on how you sell (§ 25-12-3(B)): on a label on the package when the package is the unit of sale; on a label on the container for bulk sales; on a placard at the point of sale for unpackaged items; on the webpage where the item is offered for sale; and — the rule no other state in this series has — for telephone or custom orders, no label is required, but you must tell the buyer that the food is produced at a private residence that is exempt from state licensing and inspection and may contain allergens. Either way, keep the information readily available and give it to any consumer who asks (§ 25-12-3(D)).

Two extras the regulators publish (guidance, not statute — include them anyway): Albuquerque’s Environmental Health Department says all sub-ingredients must be broken out in your ingredient list — their example: “butter (cream (milk), salt)” instead of just “butter.” And New Mexico State University’s food safety guidance adds an accurate net quantity statement — weight or volume in both English and metric units, or a count. Neither item appears in the Act’s four-item list, but both come from the people who enforce and teach this law, and a good label carries them.

One relief: unlike several states in this series, New Mexico sets no minimum font size and no color rule for the statement. Print it clearly and legibly, and you’re following the law as written.

WHERE YOU CAN SELL IN NEW MEXICO

Directly to consumers, anywhere in New Mexico — and the statute names the channels: farmers markets, festivals, roadside stands, at your home for pick-up or delivery, on the internet, and through mail delivery. That last pair makes New Mexico rare: online sales and shipping aren’t a gray area or an agency’s interpretation — they’re in § 25-12-3(A)(2) itself. Food in transit still has to be transported in a sanitary manner, protected from pets, children, and other hazards.

The boundaries: every sale must be to an end consumer inside New Mexico. No sales to restaurants, wholesalers, or distributors; no reselling through stores; no sales outside the state — if you want those channels, that’s a commercial manufactured food permit conversation with NMED, not the Homemade Food Act.

The Bernalillo County wrinkle: State law (§ 25-12-3(F)) allows Bernalillo County and the City of Albuquerque — which together run a combined local health department — to operate their own mandatory or voluntary permit system for homemade food. Here’s how that stands today: Albuquerque requires no permit at all (its Environmental Health Department says sales are allowed without a permit from NMED, Bernalillo County, or the City), NMED has no jurisdiction there, and the City’s health department is your local regulator and the office to call with product questions (505-768-2738). The authority for a local permit exists on paper even though it isn’t being used that way — one more reason to re-check the City’s page if you’re selling in Albuquerque.

Enforcement is warning-first: NMED (or the local department in Bernalillo County) enforces the Act, can investigate suspected foodborne illness, and can stop the sale of suspected contaminated food — but it must issue a written warning before any fine, and only ignoring a warning is a misdemeanor (fine up to $100 per violation). Follow the Act and the warning-first design means no surprises.

YOUR 3 STEPS TO START

  1. Get your food handler card first. Complete a department-approved food handler certification course before you produce anything for sale — it’s a condition of the exemption, not a nice-to-have. (NMSU notes the certification is valid for three years.) While you’re at it, check your product list against the non-TCS rule: nothing refrigerated, no cream or custard fillings, no refrigeration-hungry frostings.
  2. Build your label — all four items, plus the guidance extras. Processor name, home address, phone, and email; the product’s common name; ingredients in order (with sub-ingredients broken out, per Albuquerque’s guidance); and the exact home-produced statement. Add an accurate net quantity in English and metric units, per NMSU’s guidance. Then set up the same information for your other formats — market placard and sales webpage — and learn the one-sentence disclosure for phone and custom orders.
  3. Sell direct, sell in-state, use every channel the Act gives you. Home pickup and delivery, markets, festivals, roadside stands, your own webpage, and mail delivery anywhere in New Mexico are all open from day one — with no sales cap to track. Just keep the food sanitary in transit, and keep restaurants, wholesalers, and out-of-state buyers for a future commercial permit.

Keep exploring: see the Cottage Food Laws by State hub (https://cottagebakersupply.com/cottage-food-laws-by-state/) for every state’s rules, and the free tools page (https://cottagebakersupply.com/tools/) — the Cottage Label Generator and the Cottage Cost Calculator — built for home bakers.

OFFICIAL NEW MEXICO SOURCES

This guide is for informational purposes only and isn’t legal advice. Cottage food laws change — I last verified this page on October 23, 2026. When in doubt, ask the New Mexico Environment Department — or, in Bernalillo County and Albuquerque, the City of Albuquerque Environmental Health Department.

Just add sprinkles!