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“The penalty for getting caught is so great that I have to imagine that they aren’t leaving it up to chance.”Īnother way illegal ingredients find their way to Manhattan’s highest dining rooms is appropriately opulent: The contraband is flown private. His best guess is that they’re paying off officials.
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“I don’t know how they get through customs,” says the anonymous foodie.
#BLACK MARKET EATS FULL#
It’s packed in suitcases full of ice, flown to a European city, then sent on to New York - where it is sold to deep-pocketed gourmands. It goes for around $15,000 a pound” - roughly double the cost of the finest legal caviar, such as golden osetra or kaluga.Īccording to the same source, the roe makes its way to New York from either Russia or Iran. “It comes in a couple times a year, and is brought in by a few different guys. “Access is still occasional,” a source with knowledge of the beluga caviar market in New York tells The Post. Nevertheless, it remains available to wealthy devotees. Since 2005, the US Fish & Wildlife Service has banned the import of the fancy fish eggs, which come from the critically endangered beluga sturgeon. AlamyĬhief among the offenders, he says, is 007’s favorite treat: beluga caviar. Chef Virgilio Martínez had a dustup with customs officers over bringing piranhas to the states. “Some of it gets caught, but most of it doesn’t,” says Baum - who describes himself as well-acquainted with the culinary underground, despite only trafficking in legal eats himself. “Not to make it sound drug war, but a s - - tload of product is crossing the border,” Zach Baum, founder of luxury food-and-wine concierge business Reservoir Consulting, tells The Post. Those in the know say that just about anything can be had for the right price. list of species in danger.” (He did eventually get the piranhas through, and reportedly served them at LA restaurants Vespertine and Somni.)īut in New York, where rock-star chefs love to raise the stakes and the superrich covet gout-inducing dinners, the black market for illegal ingredients is very intentional - and very robust. Martínez - who planned to cook the sharp-toothed fish for a crowd - tells The Post that there was confusion on both sides: He has “very little knowledge” of which ingredients are legal and illegal in the US, beyond “the regular. Take Virgilio Martínez, the Peruvian, Michelin-starred chef behind restaurant Central, who made headlines last month when customs held him up for toting 40 frozen piranhas in a duffel bag through Los Angeles International Airport.Īlthough it’s illegal to import live piranhas into the US, frozen piranhas are technically OK if they’re being brought for personal consumption.
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It’s worth it, they say, for a good meal - and bragging rights in the kitchen. They’ve long snuck in eyebrow-raising, sometimes outright-illicit delicacies, including beluga caviar, French cheeses and exotic animal meat. Foie gras may soon be illegal in New York City, as the fight to eliminate the liver of force-fed geese from menus here heats up in the chambers of City Council this week.īut even if the ban goes through, it may warrant nothing more than a blasé “challenge accepted” from ballsy chefs.