WTF?! This food is banned in America
Alabama has a pecan festival, coffee beans are grown in Hawaii and Minnesota is nicknamed the ‘bread and butter state’. Yes, America has quite a lot to offer culinarily ! But you’ll never come across these ten foods there – they’re completely banned. What?!?
Haggis
The American food and drug authority is very clear about it: lung meat is not suitable for human consumption. And the Scottish dish haggis is made from offal, including lungs… So it’s banned!
Caviar
Enormously popular in the nineties. But sturgeon, the fish caviar is extracted from, is threatened with extinction. That’s why the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service decided in 2005 that importing fish eggs from the Caspian Sea would no longer be permitted.
Redfish
Especially popular in New Orleans: sea bass. But this fish is also threatened with extinction, so it’s now on a blacklist. No more redfish on the menu in the U.S.!
Shark fin
Do you know how they get shark fins? The shark is caught, its fins are cut off and then it’s tossed straight back overboard. Cruel! And what’s more: sharks are also an endangered species. So sorry to all the Chinese restaurants: no more shark fin soup.
Turtle
Also endangered, so protected in America.
Pufferfish (fugu)
Life-threatening: one slip with your knife and pufferfish is the last thing you’ll ever eat. That’s because of the poison tetrodotoxin found in the fish. In Japan, fugu may only be filleted by chefs who have trained for years.
Horse meat
They shoot horses, don’t they? Sure, but then you’re not allowed to stew them. In Italy they use it to make baby food; in America, it’s a big fat no.
Unpasteurized milk
No raw milk in the States, but this isn’t undisputed. Although pasteurization protects against listeria and salmonella, for example, there are still people who believe it’s healthier to drink milk raw, straight from the cow. For now, they’re breaking the law, because selling unpasteurized milk is strictly prohibited in most states.
Ackee
Fruit from West Africa, but you absolutely may not bring it into America. If the fruit isn’t ripe yet, it’s extremely poisonous.
Kinder Surprise
What? An egg with a toy inside? Banned? Yes, indeed, because in America no food may be sold if it contains something inedible. And well, that little trinket in the egg really is made of plastic… That’s why they introduced Kinder Joy in 2018, in which the toy is packaged separately from the egg. But that’s pretty much the whole principle of a Kinder Surprise: that it’s, so to speak, a surprise.
Read also:
- Do you share this chocolate sentiment?
- Survival guide: eating out in the U.S.
- Trump’s doctor: ‘I mashed the cauliflower into his potatoes’
