There are plenty of things on the TSA’s list of prohibited items that make sense for not being allowed to bring them in your carry-on or personal bag due to, among other things, concerns about using them as a weapon or as part of a bomb.

• Guns
• Night sticks
• Peanut butter (if you can spill it, spray it, spread it, pump it or pour it, it can’t be in your carry-on bag. Peanut butter can spread)
• Utility knives

Many items that aren’t allowed in your carry-on or personal bag though, are perfectly fine in your checked bag. Yet others aren’t even allowed in your checked bags (usually due to concerns of fire or explosion). Some examples of those would include:

• Alcohol spirits over 140 proof
• Fireworks
• Bear spray
• Dynamite

And then there are items you’re not allowed to have in your checked luggage that are OK to bring in your carry-on or personal bags. They would include:

• Anything with a lithium battery
• Butane-powered cordless curling irons

Most are international

Most items that are prohibited in one country are going to be prohibited in another. I mean, you’re not going to find ANY country that allows people to carry guns or knives with them on a commercial flight. However, there will be a couple of things that may be prohibited in one country that are perfectly fine in another. Or you may be able to bring them in your checked bag in one country but not in another.

Take marzipan, for example.

Marzipan???

Yes, marzipan.

PC: Aurelien Guichard // flickr // CC BY-SA 2.0

Marzipan is a confection consisting primarily of sugar and almond meal, sometimes augmented with almond oil or extract. It is often made into sweets; common uses are chocolate-covered marzipan and small marzipan imitations of fruits and vegetables. It can also be used in biscuits or rolled into thin sheets and glazed for icing cakes, primarily birthday cakes, wedding cakes and Christmas cakes. Marzipan may also be used as a baking ingredient, such as stollen or banket. (thanks, Wikipedia!)

What’s wrong with marzipan?

In the US? Nothing. The TSA doesn’t include marzipan in its list of things you can’t bring, either carry-on or checked bags.

But in other countries, apparently, marzipan can be an issue.

According to “John,” a worker at Dublin Airport, the treat tends to set off an alert when it’s in checked bags. The almond paste confection can be read to the scanners as an explosive because the two have the same density (roughly 8 to 11 ounces per cup).

“Don’t ever pack Marzipan in your luggage. It has the same density as some explosives so your bag will be removed and you’ll be called from the plane for a bag search,” he told RSVP Live earlier this year.

Invented in 1958, Semtex, a general-purpose plastic explosive, was popular with the IRA and Arab terrorists in the late 1900s. And apparently, it’s similar in density and appearance to marzipan. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Why doesn’t the TSA have issues with marzipan?

No idea. Again, “snacks” are apparently A-OK.

I suppose it could be as simple as the fact that marzipan isn’t as much of a “thing” in the U.S. as it is in Europe. But if you decide to travel with marzipan, it might be a better idea to put it in your carry-on so you can at least explain it if and when the scanner thinks you’re carrying plastic explosives.

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