To most people, the word "delicacy" brings to mind a culinary oddity that is both rare and expensive. If individuals who partake of such indulgences can face revulsion from those of less sophisticated palates, a high price tag becomes the only obstacle to enjoyment. However, on July 26, one such delicacy will become illegal in Chicago.
In April, the Chicago City Council voted overwhelmingly (49 to 1) in favor of a ban on the sale of foie gras—the enlarged, fatty livers of geese and ducks. The measure makes Chicago the first city to implement this type of legislation.
From its inception, the ordinance saw support from Farm Sanctuary, a national organization working to combat the abuses of industrialized farming, and specifically bent on ending the production of foie gras worldwide. Adding this Chicago law to their list of accomplishments, Farm Sanctuary's mission is making significant headway in recent years.
Israel—the world's 4th largest foie gras producer—has since put an end to the product on the basis of cruelty. California recently passed a measure to ban foie gras production in the state, fazing out its sale by 2012. While no such farm currently exists, a ban on the raising of foie gras in Illinois passed the Senate unanimously, with the Illinois House (on the agenda for 2007) being the last obstacle for its production in the land of Lincoln.
Independent of these measures, far north side Chicago Alderman Joe Moore put in a proposal last year banning sale of the bird liver city-wide. In an effort to convince the rest of city council, a charge was led by Farm Sanctuary, with other animal rights organizations and individuals—including PETA (the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) and Loretta Switt, of MASH fame—joining in chorus to testify in committee.
Losing a Freedom of Choice
Most of Chicago residents likely has never eaten- and would perhaps have difficulty even pronouncing- foie gras (fwa-gra), but for those who enjoy the fatty liver as a precious delicacy, the city's ordinance came as a stunning disappointment.
"It's one of a kind," says renown chef Allen Sternweiller owner of Allen's, The New American Café—a swank eatery in Chicago's gallery district. He claims the flavor and texture of foie gras has no comparison. "If you get different colored carrots, they all taste like a carrot. If you get hundreds of different types of apples they generally taste like an apple with different flavor variances. But we can't match foie gras; foie gras doesn't taste like anything else."
This uniqueness makes the product a good seller for chef Sternweiller. "I have a tremendous amount of foie gras sales, even before the ban was announced," he says.
In fact, the new ordinance has only increased popularity of the now-banned bird liver. Sternweiller says that orders for foie gras have doubled or even tripled in the last few months with publicity of the soon-to-be-enacted city ordinance.
While restaurateurs, gourmands and others aimed to block the amendment, decrying the measure as encroaching upon a freedom of choice, their argument was unable to sway city aldermen. However, despite losing what many consider a precious gourmet ingredient to city law, Chicago's pro-foie gras camp intends to go out with a bang.
On Tuesday, July 11th, a Chicago culinary association known as Chefs for Choice is putting on a fundraising event dubbed "A Festival of Foie Gras." The affair, held at Sternweiller's café, boasts a who's who of A-list chefs from some of Chicago's most elite restaurants and bistros, including Copperblue, Tru and Blackbird. They will be joined by other chefs from out of state to showcase foie gras in all its glory. The gathering promises a variety of foie gras presentations for a mere $150 per person, with proceeds for the evening going to support the association's "Freedom of Choice Fund."
"Hopefully we can raise some positive awareness about foie gras," says Sternweiller. But others paint a different picture of the coming evening.
"This event is a cruelty orgy," exclaims Bruce Friedrich, spokesman for PETA, "These guys will live to be ashamed of themselves."
Friedrich explains that foie gras farms are not some "Club Med for birds" as purveyors of the specialty foodstuff might have one believe. "There are three foie gras farms in the U.S. and they have all been investigated in the last few years," Friedrich says. "Each investigation found sick, dead and dying animals, some with holes in their necks from pipe injuries. One investigation found ducks with bloody beaks and their wings twisted together, jammed into wire cages. In another farm, birds were dangling from wires as blood spilled from their necks and onto the birds beneath them."
Despite evidence strongly suggesting animal cruelty, those who enjoy foie gras do not concede to that understanding.
"My wife and I belong to the Lincoln Park Zoo, to the Brookfield Zoo, we donate money to the anti-cruelty society," admits Sternweiller, "In the chef's community and with people who eat foie gras, I've not met anyone who's pro-cruelty to animals. I'm not out to combat the [animal activists]. I'm out to make sure that the freedom of choice is still available in the country." "This is not an issue of choice," says Bernard Sieracki, a lobbyist for Farm Sanctuary and professor of Political Science at Illinois State University in Bloomington, "it's like saying sex with children is an issue of choice. There are some things that are not relative and this is certainly one of them.
Sieracki explains that culture is defined by the laws it enacts. "And our culture does not condone the torture of small animals," he says.
Cruelty Debate
To convince Chicago City council of the cruelty involved in foie gras, animal rights advocates ran a video as part of their testimony. The five minute length documentary depicted torturous conditions seen on foie gras farms. Hosted by past James Bond star Roger Moore, the graphic footage proved convincing evidence.
"As revolting as it is to eat an animal's diseased organ," says Moore in the documentary, "the cruel treatment of the birds is even more disturbing."
But others question allegations that the force-feeding process is a kind of torture. According to some estimates, mankind has been feasting on the enlarged fatty livers of migratory birds as far back as 2500 B.C. Before a migratory journey, some fowl naturally eat to the point of liver enlargement to sustain their travel. While it is not nearly to the degree as seen on modern factory farms, those in support of foie gras claim that the practice of force-feeding (known as gavage) mimics a natural behavior.
Sternweiller and others claim that a better solution would have been to work for regulatory measures on foie gras farms rather than banning consumption.
"I'm not a lawyer and I'm not a duck farmer, but with the research that I've done there are a lot of things that animal activists say to possibly manipulate the general American public," says Sternweiller.
"The Chicago Aldermen are not particularly concerned about animal welfare anymore than the general public," Freidrich points out. "And they voted 49 to 1 to ban the stuff because they saw what reality was like on foie gras farms and they said, 'not in our town.' The video shows the reality of foie gras farming and it is so cruel that even a guided tour for Charlie Trotter couldn't be cleaned up to the degree that he felt he could serve it."
Indeed, local celebrity chef Trotter will not be seen at "The Festival of Foie Gras" event, having banned the bird liver from his establishment long before the city council deemed its sale illegal. Friedrich says that Trotter was outraged by what he saw at foie gras farms.
Even so, some critics of the foie gras ban point to this legislation as the start of a dangerous direction. Due to the treatment of veal calves, boiling live lobsters, or even eggs, some fear foods that many now enjoy could become forbidden.
Mayor Daley also did not favor the ban, complaining that the city council was wasting time on foie gras in the face of so many other pressing matters. As Chicago had passed a smoking ban mere months earlier, the Mayor expressed that laws in the city could progress to the point where people could soon not even drink.
"I have a fish tank. I don't want any aldermen coming up there, putting their hands in and start eating sushi," Daley sarcastically commented to the committee. "My little fish there. That would really bother all of us."
"Foie gras really is the worst of the worst," comments Friedrich. "Everyone from Pope Benedict XVI to the Israeli Supreme Court has condemned foie gras production because when people find out what's entailed, they don't think it should be legal. The slippery slope argument is an argument of convenience for those that are trying to protect this violent industry. But each practice should stand or fall on the basis of whether Americans believe the practices should be legal or not. That's what democracy is about."
For a city once characterized as "Hog butcher to the world," many note the irony in the Chicago law. However, some suggest that legislation from the beginning of Chicago's history points to sensitivity in this matter. "This is very much in conjunction with what [Chicago] has been doing since the day of its inception," explains Sieracki. "In 1837 when Illinois legislators charted Chicago as a city, it gave them 37 areas that [lawmakers] could regulate. One of those areas was the slaughter of animals in the marketplace."
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