The rest of the world loves soccer. The rest of the world also loves to eat goat meat. Yet Americans remain lukewarm (at best) to both. Coincidence? Andrew Zimmern doesnt think so.

The James Beard award-winning television personality and chef is a big fan of goat, and he cant understand why his fellow citizens are decidedly unaware of the virtues of this under-the-radar animal protein, much in the same way we still cling to our beloved NFL football over actual football (soccer).

Goat accounts for about 6 percent of red meat consumption worldwide , with the annual per capita consumption for goat weighing in at 1.7 pounds . The highest level of goat meat consumption anywhere in the world is Sudan, where 8.6 pounds of goat is consumed per person annually . The industrialized country with the biggest appetite for goat is China, with 3.5 pounds eaten per capita each year.

Depending on your familys heritage and the part of the country in which you live, you might have more than a passing familiarity with goat meat. You might have enjoyed celebratory meals of slow-roasted cabrito at your abuelas house. Perhaps the Jamaican side of the family made the reputed-aphrodisiac Mannish Water (goats head soup). Your Greek might have insisted that it wasnt a proper Easter celebration without a whole roasted goat . But if those culinary traditions are not part of your background, you most likely have never eaten goat.

Based on numbers provided by Tatianna L. Stanton, the organizer of the goat program in the Department of Animal Science at Cornell University, its estimated that we consume only 0.25 pound of goat meat annually per capita in the United States.

And thats not because we dont eat a lot of meat. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the average consumer will eat a record-high 222.2 pounds of red meat and poultry this year . So, although many of us are hungry for meat in general, we dont seem to collectively have much of a craving for goat meat.

Whats wrong with the United States? Zimmern thinks weve been woefully misinformed. Most people believe goat is a tough, barnyard meat that is somehow less desirable than pork, beef or lamb. I just dont get it, he told HuffPost. As the host of Travel Channels Bizarre Foods, hes traveled the globe and eaten plenty of goat.

Ive had superb goat curries in the Caribbean, roast baby goats with chile vinegar and onions in Venezuela, spicy wok-tossed goat and lemongrass in Vietnam, elegant Michelin-starred plated goat rib and loin plates in Europe, goat head soup in Argentina, raw goat in Ethiopia, goat with lemons and chiles in Cyprus and goat cooked with yogurt and flatbread in the Levant, he said.

Other in-the-know culinary professionals agree with Zimmern. Goats are noble creatures of great utility, and its time someone put some work into their PR, James Whetlor , chef and founder of goat meat producer Cabrito , said in the introduction to his book Goat: Cooking and Eating . Many people, including Whetlor, think we can reform our animal-based protein production process by switching our eating habits to goat meat . Not only is goat often referred to as the healthiest of red meats , but goats can also leave the land a little better than they found it, since they subsist on the weeds other animals ignore.

The function of goats on a farm is really remarkable, said Dan Barber , the James Beard award-winning chef-owner of New York Citys Blue Hill and Westchester restaurant and education center Blue Hill at Stone Barns, and the author of The Third Plate .