Renowned Scottish producer to introduce ‘banned’ haggis to America using new recipe

The producer has come up with a new recipe to bring haggis to America

It is one of Scotland’s best-known delicacies that has been banned in America for more than 50 years.

Now Scotland’s biggest haggis producer is set to bring the traditional dish back to the US using a new recipe designed to crack one of the world’s biggest export markets.

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Macsween of Edinburgh is creating a recipe for haggis that will comply with American food regulations to sell to the States, where the dish has been banned since the 1970s.

Under former US president Richard Nixon, it became illegal to import haggis from Scotland in 1971 as there was a sanction on food containing sheep lungs, which constitutes a portion of the traditional haggis recipe.

It is the lung component of haggis that gives the dish a crumbly texture. But to circumnavigate the ban, Macsween will use sheep’s heart instead in what managing director James Macsween called a “significant opportunity”.

He said: “In response to this long-standing ban, we have been innovating to create a compliant version of haggis without compromising the dish’s authentic flavours and texture”.

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Mr Macsween said there was a loss of almost £2 million annually for the wider industry in potential haggis sales in America due to the ban.

This is not the first foray into a new recipe haggis for an overseas market. Macsween has previously made changes to its haggis recipe by using lamb heart and fat so it can sell the product into Canada and the firm’s vegetarian haggis is available in America. In the UK, Macsween also makes beef haggis for high street supermarket M&S.

Those Americans looking to celebrate with ‘proper’ haggis on Burns Night this Saturday will have to wait, as it is expected the new recipe from Macsween will not be available until 2026, with the product is still being tested.

Macsween are not the first business to attempt to accommodate the haggis recipe restrictions. McKean's of Glasgow took their haggis-making operation across the Atlantic Ocean to Bangor, Maine in 2004. The firm proclaimed its Maine factory as "the home of Scottish haggis in the US". McKean’s also use lamb heart in place of lungs, and the company’s haggis is held together in an artificial casing.

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Joelle Hayden, who works for the US Department of Agriculture, the Food Safety and Inspection Service, has previously confirmed a ban on haggis exists as the organisation “determine sheep lungs to be inedible and, therefore, cannot be utilised for human consumption”.

There have long been reports of haggis smuggling as a result, with the New York Times telling of people bringing haggis over from Canada where, despite the ban on lungs, some butchers make haggis with the authentic recipe anyway. The delicacy has been allegedly brought into the US through the post or mail or by residents making it themselves.

Chef Nick Nairn reportedly smuggled haggis in a suitcase for a client in New York. Outlander star Sam Heughan also spoke to The Scotsman’s Scran podcast about haggis smuggling for the BAFTA Annual Burns Bash.

James Macsween, managing director Macsween of Edinburgh.James Macsween, managing director Macsween of Edinburgh.
James Macsween, managing director Macsween of Edinburgh.

According to UK government figures, the total export value of haggis from Scotland was £8.8 million over the past decade. This was accompanied by a 136 per cent increase in the tonnage of haggis shipped worldwide to places such as Iceland, Malta and the Czech Republic.

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