CHICAGO'S ban on the sale of foie gras has left chefs in the one-time big-shouldered hog butcher to the world shaking their heads and wondering what the next forbidden menu item will be.
Last Wednesday, the Chicago City Council drew headlines by outlawing the sale of the luxury ingredient. The ordinance, which was proposed by Alderman Joe Moore, passed on a voice vote. It takes effect in mid-June. A similar measure was approved by the California Legislature in 2004, but doesn't take effect until 2012. That law will also prohibit production of foie gras.
Animal rights groups have long criticized the making of foie gras -- fattened duck or goose liver -- as cruel because to produce the delicacy, the fowl must be force-fed for two weeks before slaughter.
"My biggest fear is what's next, " says Grant Achatz, chef at the cutting-edge restaurant Alinea. "Veal? Then rabbit? Squab? Let's face it, you can take apart just about any commercially grown animal and find some flaw in the raising process. It just depends on how far people want to push it."
Paul Kahan, chef at Blackbird and Avec, agrees. "The implications are so far-reaching," he says. "Do we want politicians deciding what we can and cannot eat? I feel it's incredibly hypocritical because there are so many things people eat every day that are raised in an inhumane way. The way chickens are raised, if people saw it ... commodity pork, I could just go on."
In fact, Farm Sanctuary, one of the organizations behind the foie gras ban, also has ongoing campaigns against practices in the veal and poultry industries, as well as another in favor of recognizing animals as "sentient beings" that are not "mere commodities to be exploited for food and fiber."
"Farm Sanctuary is trying to educate people to the cruelty of factory farming," says Meghan Beeby, the organization's campaign manager. "People just aren't aware of the psychological torture animals undergo in modern agriculture. What we are mostly concerned with is the cruelty involved in factory farming, and foie gras is one of the cruelest of the industries."
Similar bans are proposed in Hawaii, Illinois and Massachusetts.
High-profile chefs have long been targeted by animal rights activists. Michael Cimarusti, chef-owner of Los Angeles restaurant Providence, remembers protesters lined up outside Manhattan landmark Le Cirque when he worked there more than a decade ago. "This debate has been going on for a long, long time," he says.
