Foie gras is back on Chicago menus after a two-year ban, but it's not the only traditional delicacy that's been restricted or deemed socially unpalatable. Maggot cheese, anyone?
Chicago's gourmands got some good news this week when the city's two-year-old ban on foie gras was officially lifted. The repeal was a defeat for animal rights groups who pushed to ban the French delicacy because it is made from the fatty livers of geese and ducks that have been force fed. But the pricey dish is not the only traditional food that's restricted (or shunned) around the country because of health or political concerns. Here are some other controversial gourmet favorites, from maggot cheese to haggis, that you may or may not be able to find on a menu near you.
1. Casu Marzu Maggot Cheese Yes, you read that right: maggot cheese. This is one delicacy that's both an acquired and a forbidden taste. Casu marzu is a runny white cheese made by injecting Pecorino Sardo cheese with cheese-eating larvae. The cheese can pose various health hazards, such as an intestinal larval infection or even the risk of larvae jumping into your eye. Because of these threats, casu marzu can't legally be sold in Italy, though farmers on Sardinia and in northern Italy's Piedmont and Bergamo areas still produce it for their own clandestine consumption. United States regulations don't even address this particular type of cheese—perhaps because no one has been brave enough to put it on an American menu.
2. Puffer Fish The eyes and internal organs of this fish are highly toxic, but the meat is a delicacy in Japan and Korea. Japanese chefs are specially trained to prepare fugu, as the dish is known, so as not to kill their customers, but it's a tricky business. Your life is in the chef's hands. The animal contains tetrodotoxin, a powerful neurotoxin that damages nerve tissue and for which there is no antidote. Puffer poisoning can result from touching incorrectly prepared puffer soup, chiri, or from raw puffer meat. Saxitoxin, the cause of paralytic shellfish poisoning, can also be found in puffers. Adventurous diners can find the dish at top Japanese restaurants in some American cities, including New York, Philadelphia, Chicago and L.A., though harvesting puffers is forbidden in Florida.
3. Raw Milk Cheese Don't get caught driving cross-country with a ripe hunk of unpasteurized French brie; it's against FDA regulations. The FDA says you can't transport raw milk across state lines, and you can sell unpasteurized cheeses only if they have been aged at least 60 days and stored at a frigid 35 degrees Fahrenheit—treatment that would likely be considered by the French to be cruel and unusual punishment of an innocent fromage.
4. Absinthe This green liqueur, which was reputed to produce hallucinations and act as an aphrodisiac, became popular in France in the 1850s. In July 1912 the Department of Agriculture banned absinthe in America for its "harmful neurological effects." Federal authorities now permit the sale of absinthe only if manufacturers can prove that thujone (the ingredient that produces the neurological effects) levels are almost undetectable and if they added a qualifier to the word absinthe. But recently a team of scientists analyzed samples of the original preban 19th-century French absinthe and found that it didn't have enough thujone to be mind-altering, but that at 70 percent alcohol the drink was about 140 proof, which may account for some of those hallucinations.
5. Sassafras The dried root bark of the sassafras tree native to North America has been used for centuries for making tea, as a painkiller and as a seasoning for Creole soups and stews. The bark contains an oil called safrole, which the FDA banned for use as an additive in 1960 because studies linked the consumption of safrole to liver cancer in rats. Since then the United States has banned the sale of any ingestible product that contains more than a small amount of safrole. The root bark extract and leaves are now treated commercially to produce a safrole-free product that provides sassafras flavor without the health risks.
6. Haggis In 1989 imports of this traditional Scottish dish made from the internal organs of sheep were banned from the United States due to concerns that it could carry bovine spongiform encephalopathy, a.k.a. mad cow disease. British authorities dispute these concerns, and haggis is widely sold in Scottish supermarkets. Recipes vary, but the pungent delicacy usually contains sheep lung, liver and heart minced with onion and then boiled in the animal's stomach, though modern versions sometimes use artificial casings.
7. Lobsters The organic supermarket chain Whole Foods stopped selling live lobsters in 2006 in response to PETA and other animal protection groups that said the store could not guarantee that the crustaceans were handled humanely in transport. Other supermarkets have followed suit, but there hasn't yet been a widespread removal of the creatures from seafood counters. According to the Lobster Liberation Web site, created by PETA, lobsters can feel pain, and they suffer when they are cut, broiled, or boiled alive. (In fact, boiling lobsters alive is illegal in Reggio, Italy.)
8. Foie Gras Chicago foie gras fans may have gotten a reprieve this week, but now Californian fans may have to look for the rich treat far from home. The sunshine state has passed a law banning the French delicacy as of 2012 because of animal cruelty concerns. (Ducks and geese are force fed up to four pounds of food a day though metal pipes down their throats. The dish is then created from the enlarged liver.)Original here
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