QUEBEC PRODUCERS AREN’T HAPPY WITH FOIE GRAS BAN

Epitome of gustatory delight? Or product of heinous animal cruelty? No matter your position, foie gras is surely France’s most contentious culinary export. Translated as “fatty liver,” foie gras (over-sized lobes of duck or goose liver) is produced using a process called gavage (force-feeding animals using a tube passed into the stomach), which opponents consider inhumane. Foie gras defenders, on the other hand, suggest the dish is “perhaps the most maligned (and misunderstood) food in the world.” Now, after six years of legal back-and-forth, the U.S. Supreme Court has refused to hear an appeal from foie gras producers, making way for a state-wide ban in California to take effect. The foie gras proponents in the case included a contingent of Quebec duck and goose farmers (L’Association des Éleveurs de Canards et d’Oies du Québec) and a California restaurateur. Meanwhile, French foie gras producers, which create the vast majority of the world’s foie gras with a 70 per cent market share, called the law “an assault on French (gastronomic and cultural) tradition.”