The 1958 Food Additives Amendments created an exception for ingredients generally recognized as safe (GRAS), allowing them into food without FDA approval.

“The law was passed creating the food additive amendments. This is essentially a system where Congress said there's issues if you want to be used in food, you got to you got to file a food additive petition to FDA and get approval, right? But in doing that, they also created a an exception generally recognized as safe grass, right? And Congress said if you're generally recognized as safe, you don't have to be approved by FDA. You can you can essentially get in without that approval process, a back door of sorts.”