Sam Venable 

Department of Irony

The hottest news on the international front doesn’t come out of Iraq, Afghanistan, Russia, Indonesia, or Pakistan. Instead, it’s from bonny olde Scotland.

The Scots are asking the U.S. government to drop its importation ban on haggis. 

If that statement causes you to say “Huh? What-gis?” it’s obvious your knowledge of sheep is limited to bawdy jokes about love-starved rednecks. 

Haggis is a dish made from sheep innards, including the lungs, liver, and heart, combined with oatmeal, spices, and suet. These ingredients are then stuffed into a sheep’s stomach—I’m assuming you realize the sheep is a rather unwilling participant at this point, having already been slaughtered, skinned, and eviscerated—and boiled for three hours. Traditionally, it is served with potatoes and mashed turnips. 

Haggis is to Scots what hamburgers are to Americans. It’s their national dish, proving that enough alcohol can make any food palatable. 

Haggis imports have been banned in the United States ever since the European outbreak of mad cow disease, which is linked to Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, a human brain ailment. But the Scots insist their meat poses no health hazards. 

“It’s safe, or we wouldn’t eat it here,” a government spokeswoman told Reuters news service. “We think there is a large market for it amongst expatriate Scots in America.” 

Maybe, maybe not. 

I, personally, can attest to the relative safety of Scottish haggis because I ate some while touring there in 2003 and lived to tell about it. Mostly.

I credit this success to an iron stomach, the above-mentioned ingestion of elixirs, and a proud Tennessee heritage of souse, chitlins, potted meat, and Spam. 

What’s more, I’m certain the spokeswoman is correct about the vast number of Americans, especially here in Southern Appalachia, who trace their roots to Scotland. She’s also on the money about the growing U.S. market for kilts, bagpipes, tartans, Scotch whisky, and other products from the highlands. 

But haggis? I think not. 

Even if the import ban were lifted immediately, I can’t imagine legions of locals flocking to restaurants and ordering it. Before I opened a haggis franchise in the United States, I would invest heavily in Enron, WorldCom, Lehman Brothers, VW, the subprime mortgage industry, and the Powerball—and consider my chances of striking it rich exceedingly greater. 

True, I’ve missed burgeoning culinary markets before. Years ago, you never would have convinced me egg rolls and tacos, let alone sushi, would appear on menus all over this meat-and-potatoes town. And don’t get me started on the bottled water craze, which began when some genius brought in the first green jug of Perrier from France. 

But trust your Uncle Tastebuds on this one: Even if it’s rolled in seasoned flour, deep-fried, and layered with shredded cheese, haggis is still sheep guts. 

In our part of the world, we call that catfish bait.

Sam Venable is an author, stand-up comedian, and humor columnist for the Knoxville (TN) News Sentinel. He may be reached at sam.venable@outlook.com.