It’s not real horse meat.
That’s an important mantra to keep in mind for this week’s TribLive Taste Test, where we ordered three varieties of Illegal Chips, created by Brooklyn art collective and product start-up company Mschf.
First off, let’s be clear — there’s nothing illegal about any of this. The chips ($12 for the box with all three types) purport to be flavored like three foods whose legal status in the U.S. is dubious at best:
• Casu marzu, cheese originating from the Italian island of Sardinia. It is a Pecorino-style cheese made unique by — wait for it — drilling a hole in the top, allowing flies to lay eggs inside, and then letting the forthcoming generation of maggots eat and defecate in the cheese. Just in case you’re wondering, no, the maggots are not removed before consumption. And you have to chew ‘em up real good, or else you risk a lovely disease known as myiasis.
Again, let us stress: there are no live maggots in these potato chips. They are simply designed with a flavor profile to match that of the cheese.
• Horse. But again, say it with us: “It’s not real horse meat.”
Strictly speaking, horse meat is not illegal in the U.S. — Pittsburgh-area residents will recall that former Cure chef Justin Severino suffered some social-media (but not legal) backlash for a special dinner with Canadian chefs that included horse tartare — but the federal government typically renews an annual ban on inspection of horse meat, effectively rendering it illegal on a commercial basis.
While American consumers have a tough time envisioning it as something other than a noble companion or work animal, horse can be purchased at most supermarket butchers in France, and it is regularly served in Finland and Iceland as well.
• Fugu, a poisonous blow-fish native to oceans off the coast of Japan. Like, really poisonous.
The fish has sufficient amounts of tetradoxin in its skin and organs to both paralyze and kill a human, and chefs who wish to serve it in Japan must undergo a rigorous licensing process.
The fugu chips were developed in collaboration with chef Josh Scherer from the popular YouTube channel Mythical Kitchen, and the team was even able to build in the strange tingling sensation the fish leaves on the tongue.
Both the horse and fugu chips are vegan, and the casu marzu chips are vegetarian.
So what did we think? Well, just know that before we filmed the video, TribLive Taste Test team member Jonna Miller was not going to try any of them.
Order your own bag of Illegal Chips, available for a limited time, at IllegalChips.com.
Patrick Varine is a Tribune-Review staff writer. You can contact Patrick at 724-850-2862, pvarine@triblive.com or via Twitter .
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