Last verified: October 23, 2026. I’m a Texas home baker, not a lawyer — laws change, so always confirm with the North Dakota Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) before you sell.

NORTH DAKOTA COTTAGE FOOD AT A GLANCE

Annual sales cap: None. North Dakota’s Cottage Food Act (N.D. Cent. Code ch. 23-09.5) sets no dollar limit, no unit limit, and no revenue ceiling on what you can sell.

License or permit: Not required — and the state can’t invent one. The statute (§ 23-09.5-02(1)) says no state agency or political subdivision may require licensure, permitting, certification, inspection, packaging, or labeling for cottage food sales. No registration, no food handler course, no kitchen inspection.

Kitchen inspection: None. DHHS or a local authority may investigate only if someone complains of an illness or an environmental health problem.

Shipping: Allowed — including out of state. A 2025 law (SB 2386) removed the old bans on internet, phone, and mail sales and on interstate commerce for direct-to-consumer transactions. Uninspected poultry products are the one exception: they still can’t be sold across state lines.

Wholesale: Not allowed. Cottage food may not be sold or used in any food establishment, food processing plant, or food store (whole, unprocessed fruits and vegetables are the only exception). Every sale must run directly between you and the end consumer, and the food is for home consumption only.

WHY NORTH DAKOTA MIGHT BE THE MOST OPEN COTTAGE FOOD STATE IN THE COUNTRY

Most states hand home bakers a narrow list of approved foods, a sales cap, and a small stack of forms. North Dakota did almost the opposite. Its Cottage Food Act doesn’t cap your sales, doesn’t license or inspect you, doesn’t even mandate a package label — and its definition of a cottage food product is wide open: “baked goods, jams, jellies, and other food and drink products” made by a home producer. It even reaches foods that need refrigeration, which most states ban outright.

The framework is built on one idea: the informed end consumer. You may sell directly to the person who will eat the food at home, as long as that person knows the food is not licensed, regulated, or inspected. Your job is to make sure they really do know — that’s what the sign (or label) in the labeling section is for.

There are still real edges, and this guide walks them: the sale has to be direct and for home consumption, stores and restaurants are off-limits as buyers, meat rules are strict, and refrigerated foods carry extra label duties. One more wrinkle: the health department’s older FAQ still shows the pre-2025 bans on internet and mail sales. The statute as amended in 2025 controls — SB 2386 removed those bans — but if an inspector or market manager quotes the old FAQ at you, this guide shows you exactly where the current law lives.

WHAT YOU CAN (AND CAN’T) SELL

North Dakota doesn’t publish an approved-foods list, because the law’s definition does the work: a cottage food product is baked goods, jams, jellies, and other food and drink products produced by a cottage food operator — an individual working in a home kitchen (§ 23-09.5-01). Within that definition, the limits are specific:

Refrigerated foods are allowed — with extra labeling. North Dakota is one of the few states whose cottage law expressly contemplates products that require refrigeration. The statute’s own examples: baked goods containing cream, custard, meringue, cheesecake, pumpkin pie, and cream cheese. Those products may be sold, but they must be labeled with safe handling instructions and a disclosure statement saying the product was transported and maintained frozen (see the labeling section).

The frosting fine print: Buttercream is not named anywhere in North Dakota’s law or DHHS materials, so there is no buttercream rule to quote — there is a refrigeration test instead. If your buttercream is shelf-stable, it’s an ordinary cottage food product. If your recipe needs the refrigerator to stay safe, the product falls into the refrigerated category above and picks up the extra labeling. When in doubt, ask DHHS Food and Lodging how they’d classify your recipe.

Meat is where the law gets strict. Transactions may not include uninspected products made from meat — with one narrow exception for poultry you raised yourself: you slaughter no more than 1,000 of your own poultry in a calendar year, you don’t buy or sell anyone else’s poultry products, and the product isn’t adulterated or misbranded. Even then, poultry products can’t be sold in interstate commerce.

Freeze-dried foods: Freeze-drying is not named in the statute or in DHHS’s cottage food materials — there is no express permission and no ban. Freeze-dried candy and other freeze-dried products are food products produced by a cottage food operator, they are shelf-stable, and nothing in the Act’s short list of prohibitions touches them, so they fit the Act’s open-ended definition. Because the state hasn’t said the words “freeze-dried” out loud, treat a quick question to DHHS Food and Lodging as cheap insurance before you build a whole product line on it.

Not allowed: uninspected meat products (outside the poultry exception above); selling any cottage food to or through a food establishment, food processing plant, or food store (whole, unprocessed fruits and vegetables excepted); and sales for anything other than home consumption.

NORTH DAKOTA LABELING REQUIREMENTS

Here’s the part that surprises everyone: North Dakota law does not require a package label for ordinary cottage food products — no mandated name and address, ingredient list, or net weight. The statute actually forbids the state from imposing labeling requirements on these sales (§ 23-09.5-02(1)). What the law requires instead is that your customer is genuinely informed. Two duties do that:

  1. Display the consumer advisory — as a sign or a label, your choice (§ 23-09.5-02(8)). Either post a consumer advisory sign at your point of sale, or put a label on the product carrying this exact statement: This product is made in a home kitchen that is not inspected by the state or local health department.
  2. Inform the end consumer (§ 23-09.5-02(5)). You must inform the buyer that the product is not certified, labeled, licensed, packaged, regulated, or inspected. The sign or label above is the usual way to do it; the point is that no one buys from you without knowing.

One conditional add-on — refrigerated products only: if a product requires refrigeration (cream, custard, meringue, cheesecake, pumpkin pie, cream cheese items), its label must also carry safe handling instructions and a product disclosure statement indicating the product was transported and maintained frozen (§ 23-09.5-02(7)).

A practical note: ingredient and allergen information is not required by the state — but your customers will ask, markets may require it, and federal labeling law is a separate matter if you ship across state lines. Listing your ingredients and allergens is good practice; just know North Dakota’s cottage law doesn’t mandate it.

WHERE YOU CAN SELL IN NORTH DAKOTA

Directly to the informed end consumer, for home consumption — that’s the frame for every channel. Within it, the Act names: a farm, a ranch, a farmers market, a farm stand, your home-based kitchen, or any other venue the law doesn’t prohibit — or through delivery (§ 23-09.5-02(2)).

Internet, phone, and mail sales are allowed. Before 2025, the statute banned them. SB 2386 (2025) struck those bans, so you can take orders online or by phone and ship by mail — including to buyers in other states, because the same law removed the interstate commerce ban for direct transactions. Two limits survive: uninspected poultry products still can’t be sold across state lines, and federal law still applies to anything you ship interstate.

What never opened: stores and restaurants as buyers. Except for whole, unprocessed fruits and vegetables, cottage food may not be sold or used in any food establishment, food processing plant, or food store (§ 23-09.5-02(4)) — so there is no wholesale channel, and a shop can’t stock your cookies for resale. The transaction has to stay between you and the person who will eat the food at home.

A stale-guidance warning: the health department’s older cottage food FAQ — still floating around online — says internet, mail, phone, and out-of-state sales are prohibited and that the point of sale must be in person in North Dakota. That was true before SB 2386. The current statute (ch. 23-09.5, linked below) controls; if you’re ever questioned, that’s the text to show.

YOUR 3 STEPS TO START

  1. Fit your products inside the definition — and sort them by the fridge test. If it comes out of your home kitchen and isn’t an uninspected meat product, it’s likely a cottage food product. Anything that needs refrigeration goes in the special-labeling pile; everything else is simple. Leave meat products alone unless you are squarely inside the raise-your-own-poultry exception.
  2. Set up your consumer advisory. Print the sign for your market table or print labels with the exact statement — “This product is made in a home kitchen that is not inspected by the state or local health department.” — and make sure every buyer is informed the food isn’t certified, labeled, licensed, packaged, regulated, or inspected. If you sell refrigerated items, add the safe-handling instructions and the transported-and-maintained-frozen disclosure to those labels.
  3. Sell direct — anywhere the law allows, including online. Home, markets, farm stands, delivery, internet, phone, and mail are all open, even across state lines (poultry excepted). Just keep every transaction between you and the end consumer, for home consumption — no store shelves, no restaurant orders, no wholesale.

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 (https://cottagebakersupply.com/tools/) — the Cottage Label Generator and the Cottage Cost Calculator — built for home bakers.

OFFICIAL NORTH DAKOTA 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 North Dakota Department of Health and Human Services.

Just add sprinkles!