Business
Crafting a Haggis for American Tastes (and Import Restrictions)
When Scottish Americans and Scottish expats sit down on Saturday night to celebrate the birthday of the 18th-century poet Robert Burns, the traditional haggis will probably not be up to purist standards.
Haggis, the savory Scottish dish of boiled sheep innards, oatmeal and spices, can be a real haggis, many argue, only if it includes a key ingredient: sheep lung, which is used in the stuffing. In the United States, which bans imports of haggis with sheep lung, some Americans of Scottish heritage have turned to the black market to get their hands on the real thing.
Now Macsween, one of the more popular makers of haggis in Scotland, has developed a recipe that would meet U.S. import guidelines by replacing sheep lung with lamb heart. It’s not the first modification that Macsween, which was founded in Edinburgh in 1953, has made to its haggis. In a nod to modern tastes, it has swapped the sheep stomach that has traditionally been used as a haggis casing for a beef casing, like those used in some sausages.
“Do I think there’s something to be said for textural difference that the lung adds to it? Yes,” said Greg Brockman, a butcher in Brooklyn who has made his own version of haggis for years. “Do I think the average consumer is going to notice? Probably not.”
The new take on the delicacy is slated to arrive in the United States by this time next year, in time to be the centerpiece at Burns Night celebrations.
Burns helped turn haggis, which was traditionally consumed by peasants, into Scotland’s national dish with lines like “Fair fa’ your honest, sonsie face / Great chieftain o’ the pudding-race!” in his poem “Address to a Haggis,” which is read as part of the celebrations.
While a mere mention of the delicacy can draw winces from Americans, James Macsween, the managing director of his family business, sees possibility far beyond Burns Night.
“A lot of people eat this on a week-by-week basis,” he said. “We have done all the hard work: We have ground it, blended it, mixed it, seasoned it and made it into a very nutritious and tasty meat protein ingredient.”
Take the casing off, Mr. Macsween said, and add the stuffing as a topping or ingredient in haggis pizza, haggis lasagna or haggis poutine.
“You can make hundreds of menu suggestions,” he said. “It’s the versatility.”
Macsween sells about eight million pounds of haggis every year in Britain, where the recipe includes sheep lung. Its biggest client is the grocery and department store chain Marks & Spencer. Mr. Macsween said the haggis market is worth about 14 million pounds, or about $17.5 million.
Breaking into the U.S. market has been a challenge. Haggis was banned in the United States in the 1970s because of the ban on lung sales. In 1989, the United States banned lamb and beef imports from Britain after an outbreak of bovine spongiform encephalopathy, otherwise known as mad cow disease.
Mr. Macsween said he had been trying to enter the North American market since 2015, when he began representing the Scottish haggis and meat manufacturing industry in talks with the Canadian and U.S. governments to try to put Scottish lamb and beef back on menus across the Atlantic.
The United States relaxed its restrictions on lamb and beef imports in 2022, but because of the ban on lung sales, one thing was clear: If Macsween’s haggis were to be sold in America, it would have to substitute lamb heart.
American-made haggis is “perfectly acceptable,” Mr. Macsween said. But now, he says, it’s time to “finally get genuine Scottish haggis into the United States.”
Macsween will use the same recipe for American-sold haggis as it does in Canada, now one of its biggest markets. That includes lamb heart and fat, oatmeal, white and black pepper, aromatic herbs, salt, onion and broth.
“We know it works,” Mr. Macsween said. “It’s a tasty product, and it’s the most authentic haggis we can make within the legislation.”
Anne Robinson, the founder of Scottish Gourmet USA in Greensboro, N.C., isn’t so sure. Her company is one of the largest purveyors of domestically made haggis in America (made with ground lamb and beef liver, venison or vegetables), and she questioned whether Macsween would be able to get around the U.S. regulations. Still, she welcomed the company to what she described as “a highly specialized market.”
Mr. Brockman, the butcher in Brooklyn, lived in Scotland for four years and remembered having Macsween haggis for Burns Night celebrations with friends. Now he makes his own at Prospect Butcher Company, using uses sheep heart and liver. He usually sells about 20 pounds of it around Burns Night.
“Everyone fears it as this emblematic weird food,” he said. “But it has a wonderful mix of warm spices and there is some of that iron tang to it from the heart and liver. I don’t think it’s at all overpowering. It’s just a nice mound of food, man. It’s not appealing in shape or color, but it tastes really good and smells really good.”
Paramount Skydance Chief Executive David Ellison made his case directly to theater owners Thursday, pledging to release a minimum of 30 films a year from the combined Paramount and Warner Bros. Discovery company during a speech at the CinemaCon trade convention in Las Vegas.
“I wanted to look every single one of you in the eye and give you my word,” Ellison said in a brief on-stage speech, adding that Paramount has already nearly doubled its film lineup for this year with 15 planned releases, up from eight in 2025.
He also said all films will remain in theaters exclusively for 45 days, starting Thursday. Films will then go to streaming platforms in 90 days. The amount of time that films stay in theaters — known as windowing — has been a controversial topic for theater owners, as some studios reduced that period during the pandemic. Theater operators have said the shortened window has trained audiences to wait to watch films at home and cuts into theater revenues.
“I have dedicated the last 20 years of my life to elevating and preserving film,” said Ellison, clad in a dark jacket and shirt with blue jeans. “And at Paramount, we want to tell even more great stories on the big screen — stories that make people think, laugh, dream, wonder and feel — and we want to share them with as broad an audience as possible.”
Ellison’s CinemaCon appearance comes as more than 1,000 Hollywood actors and creatives have signed a letter opposing Paramount’s proposed acquisition of Warner Bros. Supporters of the letter have said the deal would reduce competition in the industry and “further consolidate an already concentrated media landscape.”
Some theater operators have also questioned whether the combined company could achieve its goal of releasing 30 films a year, particularly after the cost cuts that are expected after the merger closes.
“People can speculate all they want — but I am standing here today telling you personally that you can count on our complete commitment,” Ellison said. “And we’ll show you we mean it.”
The speech came after a star-studded video directed by “Wicked: For Good” director Jon M. Chu that was shot on the Paramount lot on Melrose Avenue and showcased directors and actors including Issa Rae, Will Smith, Chris Pratt, James Cameron and Timothée Chalamet that are working with the company.
The video closed with “Top Gun” actor Tom Cruise perched atop the Paramount water tower.
“As you saw, the Paramount lot is alive again,” Ellison said after the video. “And we could not be more excited.”
new video loaded: Why Your Paycheck Feels Smaller
By Ben Casselman, Nour Idriss, Sutton Raphael and Stephanie Swart
April 18, 2026
Nearly two years after actor Alec Baldwin was cleared of criminal charges in the “Rust” movie shooting death, a long simmering civil negligence case is inching toward a trial this fall.
On Friday, a Los Angeles Superior Court judge denied a summary judgment motion requested by the film producers Rust Movie Productions LLC, as well as actor-producer Baldwin and his firm El Dorado Pictures to dismiss the case.
During a hearing, Superior Court Judge Maurice Leiter set an Oct. 12 trial date.
The negligence suit was brought more than four years ago by Serge Svetnoy, who served as the chief lighting technician on the problem-plagued western film. Svetnoy was close friends with cinematographer Halyna Hutchins and held her in his arms as she lay dying on the floor of the New Mexico movie set. Baldwin’s firearm had discharged, launching a .45 caliber bullet, which struck and killed her.
The Bonanza Creek Ranch in Santa Fe, N.M. in 2021.
(Jae C. Hong / Associated Press)
Svetnoy was the first crew member of the ill-fated western to bring a lawsuit against the producers, alleging they were negligent in Hutchins’ October 2021 death. He maintains he has suffered trauma in the years since. In addition to negligence, his lawsuit also accuses the producers of intentional infliction of emotional distress.
Prosecutors dropped criminal charges against Baldwin, who has long maintained he was not responsible for Hutchins’ death.
“We are pleased with the Court’s decision denying the motions for summary judgment filed by Rust Movie Productions and Mr. Baldwin,” lawyers Gary Dordick and John Upton, who represent Svetnoy, said in a statement following the hearing. “He looks forward to finally having his day in court on this long-pending matter.”
The judge denied the defendants’ request to dismiss the negligence, emotional distress and punitive damages claims. One count directed at Baldwin, alleging assault, was dropped.
Svetnoy has said the bullet whizzed past his head and “narrowly missed him,” according to the gaffer’s suit.
Attorneys representing Baldwin and the producers were not immediately available for comment.
Svetnoy and Hutchins had been friends for more than five years and worked together on nine film productions. Both were immigrants from Ukraine, and they spent holidays together with their families.
On Oct. 21, 2021, he was helping prepare for an afternoon of filming in a wooden church on Bonanza Creek Ranch. Hutchins was conversing with Baldwin to set up a camera angle that Hutchins wanted to depict: a close-up image of the barrel of Baldwin’s revolver.
The day had been chaotic because Hutchins’ union camera crew had walked off the set to protest the lack of nearby housing and previous alleged safety violations with the firearms on the set.
Instead of postponing filming to resolve the labor dispute, producers pushed forward, crew members alleged.
New Mexico prosecutors prevailed in a criminal case against the armorer, Hannah Gutierrez, in March 2024. She served more than a year in a state women’s prison for her involuntary manslaughter conviction before being released last year.
Baldwin faced a similar charge, but the case against him unraveled spectacularly.
On the second day of his July 2024 trial, his criminal defense attorneys — Luke Nikas and Alex Spiro — presented evidence that prosecutors and sheriff’s deputies withheld evidence that may have helped his defense . The judge was furious, setting Baldwin free.
Variety first reported on Friday’s court action.
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