5 Food Items Banned in America—But Popular in Britain

are we ready yeah hello i'm lawrence and i'm on a quest to uncover all of the memos that britain and america lost in the pond and one of those memos pertains to food items that abandon america now surprisingly there are a lot of food items whose production is illegal here in the united states and it would take a lifetime of videos to list them all and so given the nature of my channel i thought i'd focus on those food items that are banned in america but are popular in britain and i must say that growing up in one country and then moving to another only to discover the complete absence of certain things that you grew up with is the very definition of a culture shark whether the food was banned with the welfare of an animal in mind or because they were afraid that five people couldn't read warning labels here are five food items that abandon america but popular in britain in britain we are absolutely obsessed with a fruit called blackcurrant when i say obsessed i mean we make drinks out of it most famously perhaps is this drink ribena and as a kid growing up this was basically the only fluid that i consumed until i discovered alcohol at nine and i think that's true of a lot of british kids the ribena not the alcohol and i think you know at some point i just couldn't have imagined a world in which blackcurrant didn't exist but to some extent that is and certainly has been the united states of america now there's probably a small gathering of experts in the comments section saying what you want about lawrence of course the production of blackcurrant isn't banned in america and that is partly true now but it wasn't between 1911 and 1966 when the cultivation sale and transport of blackcurrant was banned by the federal government and the reason for this ban is that the plant on which black currant grows acts as a host for a wood-based disease known as wood pine blister rust in a word it would have the timber industry but lawrence 1966 english people of all people know how long ago that was why are you including blackcurrant in this video for two reasons really some states still impose restrictions on black current production and number two which ties more to the culture shock aspect it seems that mostly because of these bands the majority of americans that i speak to have never even heard of blackcurrant let alone consumed it in fact according to cornell university fewer than 0.1 percent of americans have ever eaten blackcurrant that's right it is illegal in the united states to have imported from the uk one of scotland's most famous dishes what but people on this side of the pond might be thinking what is haggis is he that lovable bearded character from harry potter no haggis is a savoury pudding and it's quite a divisive savoury pudding and one of the chief reasons for that is its contents specifically the heart liver and lungs of a sheep now as somebody who's never actually tried haggis i cannot give it my lorenzo score right here today and given america's laws around this it's unlikely that i ever will you see in 1971 the united states banned the importation of haggis from the united kingdom on the grounds of the country was implementing a ban on the sale and production of anything containing sheep's lung following a 2010 review by the us department of agriculture the ban was maintained and continues to be to this day so what i want to know is would you like to see the band lifted or are we all vegetarians when it comes to this i'd also be interested to see how our respective stomachs handle this that's right the united states actually has a ban on the sale of non-refrigerated eggs but don't take my word for it instead listen to me from 2020 i've just realized that's still my word a common question that i get from my american viewers is what's the deal with british supermarkets not refrigerating their eggs it's true british supermarkets and eu supermarkets in general use non-refrigerated shells to stock their eggs putting them on a surprisingly equal footing with cadbury's cream eggs so why does this discrepancy exist between britain and america well it's a cracking question it all comes down to both countries attempts at preventing contamination basically it works like this in the united states the usda mandates that eggs must be washed and sanitized before they reach the consumer the european union on the other hand says that class a eggs must not be washed which sounds mental right except the eu believes that washing eggs can do more harm than good when a hen lays an egg she coats it in a cuticle in order to protect the egg against contamination once it you know pops out anyway it's thought that washing eggs can result in the removal of this cuticle making eggs vulnerable to pathogenic contamination in america the usda requires producers to wash eggs in water with a minimum temperature of 90 degrees fahrenheit they are then rinsed with a special cleaning spray with the intention of eradicating contamination and then dried not drying the eggs would mean that the resulting moisture could become a breeding ground for salmonella so what's this got to do with refrigeration well firstly the usda freely admits that washing the egg can remove the cuticle so chilling the eggs in store becomes more critical in britain and the eu not so much that's right it turns out that non-refrigerated eggs that came from a chicken are not the only type of eggs that are banned in the us when i was a kid i lived off a diet of ribena and chocolate now a lot's changed in the intervening years i don't drink as much ribena these days and one of those chocolates was the kinder surprise it was and is a chocolate egg inside of which was a mystery toy actually that's not even true inside of which was a capsule inside of which was a mystery toy and i just have this memory from probably i don't know 1990 or something like that i collected some teeny terror pins they weren't real just to be clear they were toys so i must have eaten about 100 kinder eggs just to get the entire collection and a hospital visit now these are primarily marketed toward children so obviously i haven't had any kinder surprises since i was 26 and that's partly because they don't have them in the united states and that's completely because they're illegal you see the federal food drug and cosmetic act of 1938 banned the sale of any candy that had embedded in it a toy or a trinket now as a not quite as exciting compromise the us does sell kinder joy eggs and it does include a toy the major difference being that the toy is included separately from the egg to be fair to america though i think i still do have one of those terrapins in my stomach i'd give anything to swap it for an entire one of these hey hold up i can feel the intensity pouring through my camera you're all in surprise overdrive how can it be cadbury chocolate banned in america well that's not entirely true in fact don't tell anybody i picked up a bar today at target you can completely buy cadburys in the united states so long as it was made here basically since 1988 the u.s rights to cadbury have been held by a small little-known confectionary business known as the hershey company and in 2015 hershey successfully sued an online retailer that was importing british-made chocolate into the u.s this legal case set a precedent it basically said that only hershey-made cadbury can be sold in america and to quell the storm of protest hershey basically said there's next to no difference between the taste of the british chocolate and the american equivalent british people disagree with this and so in my world of being an online mediator between the two countries there was an all-out war for two days personally i don't mind the american version all that much evidenced by the fact that i ate the entire thing between takes but if there is one thing over which british people will form a mutiny it's when you come after their chocolate these were five food items that were banned in the united states i'm laurence brown you can follow me on twitter lost in the pond us and don't forget to subscribe to my channel so that my videos don't get lost in the pond a big thank you to my patrons who make these videos possible if you would like to become a patron of lost in the pond you can do so today at patreon.com lost in the pond until tomorrow's video goodbye [Music] you

Channel: Lost in the Pond

Views: 252,716

Keywords: Laurence Brown, America, Banned, Cadbury, Blackcurrant, Kinder Surprise, Haggis

Id: ZgePCOUcKMY

Length: 8min 41sec (521 seconds)

Published: Thu Dec 09 2021