An Australian yeast-based spread is back on the shelves of a coffee shop in Guelph, Ont. After a back-and-forth battle between Found Coffee and the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA), jars of Vegemite are selling quickly. “We’ve actually gone through more than two-thirds of our remaining stock,” said Found Coffee owner Leighton Walters. The thick, dark brown, salty and savoury spread is made from yeast extract and is a byproduct of beer brewing. While not everyone has a taste for Vegemite, it remains an Australian staple. Back in April, the CFIA completed a routine check on the café. It found the shop’s Vegemite products were not in compliance with Cana dian regulations because of added vitamins and a lack of dual language labels. “They turned around and said no, this is a non-compliant product, you have to pull it off the shelves,” Walters recalled. “You have to take it off your menu and you’re not allowed to have it anymore.” Worried about his small business and the possibility of being fined, Walters pulled his products off the shelves. He posted a video on social media to explain his reasoning. An Australian-Canadian dual citizen living with spina bifida, Walters was undergoing surgery when the CFIA put his store’s cultural pride on pause. “It felt a little bit like you’re rubbing salt in the wound… rubbing Vegemite – because it’s so salty – in the wound,” he said. Found Coffee’s story quickly spread, garnering the attention of Australian news organizations and Prime Minister Anthony Albanese. Speaking at a news conference in Canberra on April 18, Albanese told reporters he “had an update on Vegemite-gate.” “After discussions that my government has had with the Government of Canada, and I want to thank Mark Carney and his office and his team for ensuring that the Australian café owner, Leighton Walters, can once again have Vegemite back in his café.” It also prompted a response from Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney. “This is the value of strong free trade with reliable partners like Australia – and mutual respect for our cultural treasures,” Carney wrote in a post on X. Shortly after, the CFIA released a statement saying the agency requested a risk assessment from Health Canada. “This science-based assessment has determined that the level of risk to human health from the added vitamins present in the product is low when consumed in suggested serving sizes,” the statement reads. “As such, the CFIA will work with the importer to allow the product to be sold in the short-term, including revised labelling, while we collaborate with Health Canada, the manufacturer and the importer to find a longer-term plan for Vegemite sales across Canada.” “It’s still very ambiguous,” Walters said about the situation, adding he hasn’t heard from the CFIA since. However, Walters said it’s still a sweet victory for the salty spread and his Australian identity. “It was more than just a jar of Vegemite and being Australian,” Walters said. “To me, it was more about making sure that no one else has to live through the pain that I’ve lived through [with spina bifida].” As Walters waits to hear from the CFIA, he said he’s looking forward to the future of trade between Canada and Australia. “I’m trying to find ways that we can, you know, hook up Vancouver and British Columbia and hook up different chains of supply for this product,” he said.
