INTERNATIONAL
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
A fine old tradition falls victim to mad cow fears
By LANCE GAY
Scripps Howard News Service
August 27, 2002
- What poet Robert Burns once blessed as the "great chieftain of the pudding race" is passing: The United Kingdom's Food Standards Agency is proposing to ban sheep intestines in the making of haggis.
Scottish-Americans aficionados are alarmed.
James Durward, president of the Long's Peak Scottish Highland Festival in Estes Park, Colo., said he's going to bring up the matter with British representatives who are attending the Sept. 5-8 fete, one of the largest Celtic celebrations in the United States. He also threatened to bring German-Americans into the dispute in defense of their wieners, which also are made from sheep guts.
Durward acknowledged that for many Scottish-Americans, haggis is a once-a-year acquaintance, often at a Robert Burns dinner when the poet's "Address to A Haggis" is read, and the pudding downed with Scotch whiskey to the accompaniment of bagpipes.
"It's kind of like mincemeat for me - you come across great mincemeat, and you come across mincemeat that is terrible," said Durward. "There is good haggis and bad haggis. You cannot throw it into one pot."
David Skipper, who performs Burns' poems around the United States, said he was shocked to hear that traditional haggis might be banned. But Skipper said it will not have that much impact on the United States because Americans seem to find a pate form of haggis preferable.
The recipe for haggis is deceptively simple. It consists of a sheep's stomach bag turned inside-out and salted, one sheep's lung, one sheep's heart, one sheep's liver, a half-pound of suet from around the animal's kidney, three-quarters of a cup of oatmeal, three onions finely chopped, one teaspoon of salt, one teaspoon of freshly ground pepper, a half teaspoon of cayenne pepper, a half teaspoon of nutmeg, and three-quarters of a cup of stock.
The concoction is mixed together and stuffed loosely in the sheep's stomach, and boiled for at least three hours. Because the U.S. Department of Agriculture does not regard animal lungs as meat, they are often not included in the U.S.-made product. It is traditionally served with mashed turnips, potatoes and Scotch.
The Food Standards Agency, similar to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, said it is seeking a ban throughout the European Union of the use of sheep stomachs and intestines as a "precautionary measure against the theoretical risk" of mad cow disease in sheep. In addition to haggis, about 15 percent of British sausages (bangers) are made from sheep intestine casings.
The agency stressed it was addressing only a theoretical problem, and had no evidence that mad cow disease had spread to British sheep. Scientists believe that the disease, or bovine spongiform encephalopothy, could have spread to British cattle after parts of infected sheep were used in cattle feed.
John Krebs, chairman of the Food Standards Agency, defended the decision in a statement. "The board felt it was right to recommend practical and proportionate measures that could significantly reduce the risk, even though it remains a theoretical one," he said.
The Scottish National Party blasted the decision, saying it showed "officialdom gone mad," while members of the Robert Burns Howff Club, which maintains the memory of the poet, said they were appalled by the action.
On the Net:
For a full text of "Address to a Haggis," www.robertburns.org/works/147.shtml
knoxstudio.com |
