1st April - Spaghetti don't grow on trees

Probably the best, and one of the most famous food April Fools pranks, the bbc current affairs programme Panorama ran a report about the failure of the spaghetti crop. In a deadpan manner and grave posh bbc accent the reporter talked about how the mild winter and the "spaghetti weevil" had had a disastrous efect on the crop. People are seen picking what remained of the crop off the trees. Many viewers fell for it and indeed hundreds apparently rang up the bbc enquiring where could they buy a spag bush. You have to remeber this was 1957 and spaghetti was probably viewed as rather exotic and "foreign". You can have a look at the original tv report from way back in the 50s' at the BBC Panorama website
From a tourism perspective my favourite April fools was the 8 page special suplement published by the Guardian in 1977 devoted to the remote sun kissed islands of San Serriffe. Described in the report as "the idyllic holiday spot" we learnt all about its history, its geography, its culture. It prompted hundreds of enquiries to the Guardian. All very well if San Serriffe had actually existed. The whole thing had been dreamed up as an April fools hoax - the 2 islands: Upper Caisse and Lower Caisse (San Serriffe - sanserif.... geddit) being completely fictious. This and more this April fools at the wonderfully useless Museum of hoaxes