Nigella Lawson's New Humiliation: Barred From US

As if it's not bad enough to have your ex-assistants publicly brand you a cokehead, now Nigella Lawson's admitted drug use may have gotten the celebrity chef barred from the US. Lawson was forbidden to board a Heathrow flight to Los Angeles on Sunday, the Department of Homeland Security confirms to NBC News. She had reportedly already gone through security before being turned away from the plane, and had to go back to the check-in area to retrieve her bags, sources tell the Daily Mail. "She did not look happy," says one witness.

Though it's not yet clear why Lawson was not allowed on the plane, the Mail confirms with an official that the US can and does bar foreigners who've admitted to committing drug offenses—even if they were never arrested, charged, or convicted—and Lawson admitted under oath that she's experimented with cocaine and pot. The paper claims Lawson will lawyer up in an attempt to get a waiver that will reverse the ban—an important move for her career, considering she's a judge on The Taste, which films in the US. (More Nigella Lawson stories.)