Livin’ Veg

Serve Foie Gras? You Won’t Get My Business. July 27, 2009

Last night my husband and I were up at Vassar college. He had a rehearsal for a reading of Othello. After his rehearsal we went to dinner and then to see The Burnt Part Boys (soon coming to off broadway). We went into a restaurant in Poughkeepsie called Beech Tree Grill and sat down to eat. They had a lovely looking Buckwheat Soba noodle dish. The waitress came over and mentioned that we didn’t have the full dinner menu so she brought that over. And there on it I see “Hudson Valley Foie Gras.”

Hudson Valley Foie Gras is the Foie Gras farm that has been in the news and the focus of AR groups. Especially NYS farm animal groups like Farm Sanctuary. I pointed it out to my husband and asked him if he would mind if we left. I couldn’t in good conscience support a restaurant that served such a heinous dish. I got up, went over to the waitress and said very politely, “I’m sorry but I can’t eat at a restaurant that serves Foie Gras.” She said, “I understand you feelings completely.” I said, “Hudson Valley Foie Gras is a really evil place. Please pass on my concerns to the people in charge. I just can’t support a restaurant that offers such an awful dish.”

And we left. Now, I know that eating at any non vegan restaurant is supporting cruelty. But foie gras is such a decadent and terrible “food” that it seems particularly awful. I refuse to eat at any restaurant that serves it.

Are there any reasons you’d walk out of a restaurant for moral animal related concerns? Have you ever done it? Did you tell the manager or the wait staff why?

Idiot Article in Village Voice Calls Foie Gras Humane February 20, 2009

I was extremely disappointed to read this article in the Village Voice, basically saying foie gras and how they make it up at Hudson Valley Foie Gras Farm, isn’t so bad. The simple facts behind what foie gras is should be enough for the basic human to know that it’s a cruel practice. Let’s see - force feeding a goose or duck until their liver grows to ten times the normal size… Or how about force feeding the bird 1/3 of their body weight each day in order to make their livers swell… Does that sound compassionate? Does giving a bird a diseased liver, in any way, sound like a humane practice?

Sarah Digregorio took a tour of Hudson Valley Foie Gras, and was not totally appalled by what she saw. Even though she was warned that she and her photographer would get the “nice” tour - you know, the one where they don’t show you the full story and pick out the least tortured looking birds.

Who cares that the animal experts on this know what they are talking about? Digregorio took the Hudson Valley Foie Gras farm’s word on it. And the ones making money off the diseased livers of birds - yeah, those are the ones I’d trust. Farm Sanctuary, the group doing the big campaign in NYC, wasn’t even interviewed for the article. Talk about not giving the full story!