Airport Security checkpoints and food stories....
Have you tried to board a plane with food recently? I hurangued my husband by packing him some humuus and it took 3 security people to verify it. I am glad they caught it. They also let him keep it.
Add a comment:
Previewing your comment:
HTML Hints
Some HTML is OK: <a href="URL">link</a>, <strong>strong</strong>, <em>em</em>
Comment Guidelines
Post whatever you want, just keep it seriously about eats, seriously. We reserve the right to delete off-topic or inflammatory comments. Learn more at our Comment Policy page.
If you see something not so nice, please, report an inappropriate comment.
Start Talking!
Need a question answered? Have advice to share? Start a Talk topic now!
Sign up to get your questions answered and share advice.
17 Comments:
I sent some homemade cookies in my bfs suitcase from Houston to NY and they opened the container, crushed every single cookie, and closed the container. It was in a styrofoam container and the container was fine.
FoodieCutie at 12:44PM on 03/03/08
I once brought home a giant jar of sorghum molasses from TN in my carry-on. This was before the liquids ban. It generated a lot of discussion and debate, but ultimately, I was permitted to keep it.
Another time, again on a return flight from TN, I had a big batch of ham on homemade rolls, wrapped in several layers of foil (FIL was worried we starve to death in the five hours it takes to get home, and provided us enough to feed everyone in first class). I guess it looked really weird on the xray, because they made me empty my carry-on and unwrap the food before they were satisfied that it wasn't some kind of bizarre and pathetically-built terrorist device.
LoCo at 12:58PM on 03/03/08
I stopped at Momofuku at the tail end of a recent trip to NYC. Scarfed down the pork buns in the hotel, but had to take the ramen to the airport. I ended up drinking as much of the broth as I could in the food court, drained the rest, and took the noodles and garnish through security. Folks behind me were very curious if this would work. It did.
renzata at 1:12PM on 03/03/08
I was really silly and forgot all about the regs when I hastily made a switch on which suitcase to put under and which to carry with me. I had a bottle of salad dressing that my aunt gave to me sitting on top, so they confiscated it. Duh!
When I got home, I opened up my suitcase to unpack. I chuckled to myself how silly I was to have salad dressing in my luggage and a bit sad since I liked that dressing a lot as it's not available in the continental US. A few layers below, to my surprise, I discovered an intricately hand-painted ceramic bottle...full of sake. I don't drink alcohol at all, so if they had found it, I would have told them to toss the sake, just let me keep the bottle. I was completely shocked though. Gotta love parents who give you surprise gifts...
Cassaendra at 2:16PM on 03/03/08
Apple butter. I had a beautiful jar of apple butter that had been given to me as a gift in my carry-on about 4 months ago when I was returning from a trip, not even thinking about the liquid ban. It was confiscated and I wanted to cry. But really, is apple butter a liquid? I think it's a gray area...
KitchenKore at 2:26PM on 03/03/08
I'm very particular about my pepper, so I bring a small grinder with me where ever I go. Alas, the device does not look innocent. When asked what it was the last time I went through security, the agent mis-heard me and shouted out, "Pepper spray?!?!?" Thankfully, the situation was amicably resolved.
Another agent, after hearing my story about being a pepper snob, asked me where my pepper corns came from. I had to think for a second: "Sri Lanka! Phwew."
CVilleBilly at 3:20PM on 03/03/08
A colleague of my husband is from the Czech Republic. His mother -- who speaks no English --- was coming to the US for a visit. She wanted to make his favorite cookie and wasn't sure she could get the same kind of black walnuts she needed. So she mixed up a big batch of cookie dough and wrapped it up - raw -in plastic and packed it in her carry-on. She managed to get on a plane with it but somewhere along the line (changing planes I guess) she got detained by US Customs for carrying what appeared to be plastic explosives! She spoke no English, so she didn't know what was wrong. They spoke no Czech and couldn't ask her what it was. Apparently she was detained for several hours before it all got straightened out.
Next time, I believe she plans to simply pack walnuts.
kjgibson at 3:49PM on 03/03/08
i asked a good friend to bring me some spanish olive oil from barcelona recently... after she bought me 3 bottles, she left them at home because she was traveling only with carry-ons. So now, she'll have great salad dressings on me or I will have to travel to barcelona to get them. what a shame, no?
I brought some of that delicious olive oil, along with some vinegar and wine in my suitcase during my last trip, all wrapped up in hotel towels inside a huge ziplock bag. I was soooo scared to have all my luggage and clothes smell like a salad!!!
MadelynRodriguez at 3:56PM on 03/03/08
When I visited Costa Rica with my (now ex) husband and 4 year old daughter, I raided the grocery stores about as much as any other type of establishment. I had so much stuffed into my suitcases, I just knew I'd get busted.
This happened before 9/11/2001 but if you wanted to just breeze through customs at that time, all you needed was a luggage trolley with a 4 year old child on the very front of it, smiling at everyone. I know the ramifications of this could have been terrible (given what happened a few short years later) but all I was trying to do was broaden my culinary horizons. These days I wouldn't attempt smuggling a marshmallow on a plane.
chiff0nade at 5:46PM on 03/03/08
This is not so much about airport security as it is about traveling with food. Many years ago (about 19 years I think), we took our three young daughters on vacation from the UK to an island in the caribbean where we had rented a house. My husband read that meat there was very expensive and he also read that it was possible to freeze meat, wrap it in plastic wrap and lots of newspaper and pack it in a suitcase and it would last for 24 hours. So he decided that it would be a good idea to take some with us. It also happened that we would be arriving on the night before Easter so I packed lots of large chocolate eggs and bunnys. Guess which suitcase got lost and sat on a hot runway for a day? The amazing thing was--the meat was still almost frozen. But the chocolate bunnies?? It was ugly!
smallblondemom at 9:05PM on 03/03/08
I brought a bag of Daniel Boone stone ground grits and a stick of Split Creek chevre as hostess gifts with me on a recent trip to NO -- the TSA took a longish look, but let me keep them. In general, the distinction between liquids and gels on one side, and pastes and solids on the other, seems specious and arbitrary. I strongly suspect that such routines, and the shoe and laptop fandango are expressly designed to be inconvenient, to create the illusion of a thorough security screening process.
The Gurgling Cod at 8:09AM on 03/05/08
Went to Northern Italy two years ago, and just HAD to bring back some stuff...among the goodies - a huge chunk of prosciutto and a huge chunk of Parmesan. He took one in his luggage, I took the other. We were waiting at baggage check in JFK, when two customs agents walked through with a BEAGLE. UGH! We both panicked...my fiancé turned to me and said - whoever gets their bag first goes immediately to the exit...at least one of us has to make it through! We can't lose BOTH the cheese and the meat!
The beagle stopped in front of some old woman - you know, all dressed in black with the scarf on her head and everything, with tons of boxes...she was probably bringing back tons of stuff to her family here from wherever they were from. We did not wait to find out what happened.
Cheese and meat were happily reunited and consumed for the next couple of weeks. :-)
tkln at 12:03PM on 03/05/08
Last spring I had a country ham in my carry-on that I had bought in Asheville and was bringing through security in Atlanta. Of course the x-ray technician did a double-take and brought everything to a halt. He did finally recognize it as food and asked if it was a turkey. The other guy perked up when I mentioned that it was a country ham and we joked that if he confiscated it I wanted it to go to a good home. But they let it through. I also had jars of jelly in my check-in baggage and my suitcase had been gone through, but they left the jelly.
aharste at 5:08PM on 03/05/08
In the late 90's, long before any of the serious regs we contend with today, I was flying back from Cincinnati and wanted to bring my friends a treat. They had both worked for Proctor & Gamble (HQ'ed in Cincy) and were familiar with Skyline Chili. So on the way to the airport I stopped in one and ordered 6 5-ways to go. For the uninitiated, that's their delicious beef chili over spaghetti with red beans, onions and heaps of shredded cheddar cheese. Yum!
They boxed them up and away I went. No problem with security (they chuckled at my carry-on), but I was almost jumped by my fellow passengers due to the wonderful aroma emanating from the overhead!
NorthernBBQer at 5:43PM on 03/05/08
There's a place in LA that makes these great kosher sausages. The company ships them, but then they become almost prohibitively expensive for people like us on a budget. The sausage people said they had another option. They packed all of the sausages up in a bag with dry ice. We put that bag in my husband's backpack and brought it as a carry-on back to NYC. When we opened the overhead at the end of the flight the entire bag was crusted over with ice. I'm SHOCKED no one asked about it.
Stufsocker at 9:57AM on 03/06/08
Three years ago, my family and I took a trip to Italy. We started in Rome, traveled down to the Amalfi Coast, hit Naples, Positano, Sorrento, then traveled back to Florence. Being the vinos that we are, of course we bought wine along the way, at every possible delectable wine shop. At the end of the trip, amongst the 4 of us, we had 36 bottles of wine. Including limoncello. We bubble wrapped. And we smuggled. And we didn't get caught. Bear in mind that this was 3 years ago. But a pretty fantastic feat, you have to admit!
tabsaxgu at 11:05AM on 03/10/08
on trips back from south africa and australia, various members of my family have all resorted to different methods to hide biltong (sort of like beef jerky) from the customs agents. always aware of the possibility of a roaming beagle, we've resorted to emptying half the contents out of a huge bottle of shampoo, and putting the biltong, in a ziplock, into the container to hide the smell. i've never had any of it confiscated, yet on a flight back from colorado i had an agent take away an unopened liter sized jar of creamy peanut butter, while commenting that they had been given specific instructions that peanut butter is not allowed....
danya at 2:16PM on 03/10/08