It is illegal to import haggis to the United States because it contains sheep lungs.


For many of the six million Scots in America, who enjoy the puff of warm-reeking, rich steam as the knife goes in, the ultimate in patriotism is a haggis from Scotland itself.

Reports that the US was about to lift a ban on British beef and lamb - imposed in 1989 at the height of the BSE outbreak - were greeted with a chorus of delight in 2010. But since 1971 the US has also banned food made with sheep's lung.

The classic recipe calls for the heart, liver and lung of the sheep to be chopped up and combined with pinhead (not rolled) oats, onions, suet, spices and seasoning, then stuffed in a sheep's stomach.

So to open the path for Transatlantic trade in true haggis, two rules will have to be changed.

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