So I was doing groceries and I thought some edamame would be nice. There was store brand, and also one with a label in Japanese, which I mistakenly assumed meant that it was imported from Japan.

Now I happen to like Japanese food from Japan better than Japanese food from America, so I went with the bag with the Japanese label.

Well, I pulled it out today to cook some and noticed that it has a Proposition 65 label mentioning lead exposure. I’m not used to seeing this on food. I also thought it was strange, because Japanese goods usually have better quality than this.

As it turns out, it’s not from Japan at all. It was imported from China!

On its own, importing soybeans from China doesn’t sound that awful. But they didn’t just import soybeans. They called them Edamame, which is specifically the Japanese word for soybeans. Not only that, but they wrote “Mukimi Edamame” in big Japanese letters at the top of the front of the packaging, to fool unsuspecting shoppers like me into thinking it’s a product of Japan.

If it weren’t for the lead contamination, then this would only be a simple matter of cultural appropriation, and possibly false advertising. But no, apparently they contain lead. Why are US stores even allowed to sell this? Why was it allowed through customs? What US distributor decided to import a bunch of lead contaminated soybeans?

This is not okay!