In the not-so-secret lead up to a potential war with Iran, the FBI traced a peculiar path to find terrorists: falafel sales.

Congressional Quarterly reports that in 2005 and 2006, FBI agents sifted through consumer data from San Francisco-area grocery stores hoping that sales records of falafel and other typical Middle Eastern foods would somehow lead back to homegrown terrorist cells. It didn’t.

The operation was eventually shuttered after the head of the FBI’s Criminal Investigations Division fingered the thing as useless and possibly illegal. However, he’s no longer with the FBI–he’s off to head the security division over at Verizon, where there’s surely much more useful, but far less delicious covert information.

Tags: falafel, FBI, Food, food terrorism, iran, terrorism, verizon, world war III