I was dismayed to find out that Standard Tap, an otherwise decent bar in Northern Liberties, is selling foie gras. In the words of stopforcefeeding.com,
Foie gras literally means “fatty liver” in French. To produce it, young ducks or geese have over four pounds of corn mush forced down their throats through a long metal pipe each day for two to three weeks until they can barely move and are on the verge of organ rupture and death. For a 150 pound human, this would be equivalent to 60 pounds of food per day.
The force-feeding process causes the ducks’ livers to swell up to ten times their normal size, inducing a disease that veterinarians call “hepatic lipidosis.” These fattened, diseased livers are sold as “foie gras.”
Foie gras is cruel and disgusting. It has been banned in many countries and some US cities due to its cruel nature, and countless restaurants across the country and world have dropped it from their menus. Please email Standard Tap (click here, or write to info@standardtap.com and standardtap@earthlink.net) and ask them to stop serving foie gras.
You can make a difference. They will listen to their customers, especially if would-be customers (myself included) take our money elsewhere until they drop foie gras from their menu. So, please write/boycott as you see fit!
Edit: On 11/19 Standard Tap replied via a comment below; please see what I wrote back to them. Their response is not acceptable, nor will any response be except if they come to their senses and drop foie gras.
I noticed your blog regarding Standard Tap. The following is a letter that Paul Kimport wrote about this subject to shed some light on why we serve it, and why we support the farm that supplies us with both duck legs and foie gras.
+++++
Regarding Hugs For Puppies Protesting
At Standard Tap we have been using moulard ducks from Hudson Valley for nearly eight years because of their quality. We support this farm in foie gras production because we appreciate that their ducks have been raised to be healthy on a responsible farm. We have always wanted to connect meaningfully to our farms and also to share our enthusiasm for excellent food and where it comes from with our customers. I enjoy personally visiting many of the farms that we have used over the years and I have seen ducks at Hudson Valley in all various stages of growth and I also observed their feeding. All of which impressed me as various aspects of a very well managed and humane farm.
It would be easy for us not to support foie gras farming and to avoid the politics. It would, however, be despicably spineless to do so simply in response to pressure from a misinforming campaign against the very farm that we have supported for so long. While we support and appreciate any group that wants to shine the light of knowledge and information for the betterment of life through humanitarianism and sustainable business practices, we don’t support campaigns of inaccurate slander.
Hudson Valley is an artisan specialty farm that looks to high quality restaurants and lovers of exceptionally high quality food, not to the lowest common denominator like so much of the agribusiness that envelops our food choices in nearly every corner of our lives. It has been a personal mission for me to help connect people to better food and many of the related quality of life issues that are part of farming and cooking.
Paul Kimport
Our Points
Gavage
• A French word meaning “to gorge,” gavage is also the process by which geese or ducks are
fed to produce foie gras (a fattened liver ).
• Moulard ducks are a specialty breed created for producing foie gras. It is a hybrid from a female Peking and a male Muscovy duck. Only the males are used for foie gras and the resulting breed is a very disease-resistant bird that is also capable of gaining weight more healthfully than any wild duck .
• Engorging themselves and storing that energy in their livers is a natural aspect of duck migratory behavior.
• The funnel used to feed a grain mash to the birds uses gravity only.
• The duck’s esophagus is both thick and flexible, which is an adaptation that makes it possible to consume large whole fish.
• The duck has no gag reflex because its trachea allows the bird to breathe while eating.
• The ducks at Hudson Valley exhibit no avoidance behavior (a typical fearfulness of danger common in smaller animals) towards their human acquaintances while being fed. .
Torture
• It is a word that doesn’t apply to Hudson Valley Farms practices.
• The ducks are separated into small enough groups to be handled by the same person, thereby avoiding unwanted stress to the ducks by unfamiliar human interaction.
• The ducks would be of little value to anyone if they were not healthy.
• There is absolutely no debilling of ducks at Hudson Valley.
• Some anti-foie gras activists charge that disease is a necessary symptom of foie gras production. Liver disease would, however, render the most valuable part of the moulard (i.e. the liver) useless.
• The moulard has demonstrated the capacity to go through a gavage feeding regime and then to return to a regular diet with no trouble or at any consequence to the function of the liver.
By: william reed on November 19, 2007
at 10:54 am
Below is the response I sent to William. I urge you to do the same!
William,
Thanks for your comment. However, it is of little comfort to me as a consumer. First of all, it would not be “despicably spineless” of you to remove foie gras from your menu in response to Hugs for Puppies’ campaign; it would be a smart move that respects the demands of many customers, myself included.
Second, the letter you included from Paul Kimport includes facts that are of no consequence to the conclusion that foie gras is cruel and unnecessary, and some that are just plain wrong. To comment on just a few:
* “Engorging themselves and storing that energy in their livers is a natural aspect of duck migratory behavior.” Moulard ducks used for foie gras are of a non-migratory species. No wild duck would ever consume as much food as foie gras ducks are forced to consume. These ducks’ livers become so grossly enlarged that the ducks cannot properly stand or walk. What part of that is “natural”?
* “The duck’s esophagus is both thick and flexible, which is an adaptation that makes it possible to consume large whole fish.” Ducks can still sustain injury to their esophagi and suffer as a result.
* “The ducks are separated into small enough groups to be handled by the same person, thereby avoiding unwanted stress to the ducks by unfamiliar human interaction.” Regardless of what kind of human interaction they have, these ducks live in restrictively small isolation cages- a huge source of “unwanted stress”.
I don’t know who Paul Kimport is but please pass the message on to him that much of his information is misguided and does not excuse the fact that Standard Tap serves foie gras. Myself, my friends, and many more would-be customers will not be returning to Standard Tap until you stop serving foie gras. Please listen to your customers and stop serving it.
Sincerely,
–
http://baliwhat.wordpress.com/
By: baliwhat on November 19, 2007
at 4:15 pm
Hi Dynah,
Thanks for the response. Paul Kimport is my partner at Standard Tap. One of our missions at the Tap is promote local farms and local breweries. We value traditional methods over factory farming and we often visit the farms we use.
Paul visited the Hudson Valley farm, in person along with several of the kitchen staff, and observed their methods and facility. The description he gave is based on recent, first person observation. No one I have met has actually visited this farm and seen any of the abusive treatment you described. If you have, I would be anxious to talk to you about it.
Our support of this farm comes at a price to our reputation. This is a smear campaign that tries to bully people with threats and noise. The other night protesters told people outside the restaurant that Standard Tap pollutes the Delaware River and rapes ducks! We stand by Hudson Valley farm in the face of this because not only are traditional farms important to us, the truth is important to us. Maybe they think that distorting the truth is OK… the ends justifying the means. But I think that deliberate falsehoods only undermine their arguments in the long run.
sincerely,
William Reed
By: william reed on November 19, 2007
at 9:21 pm
William,
Abusive treatment is inherent to foie gras production. If the ducks weren’t force-fed, their livers would not grow to the abnormally large size and condition necessary for foie gras. Paul may not have seen anything that appeared overtly abusive, but the fact is the all ducks involved in foie gras production are force-fed and to me, along with many other customers who are boycotting Standard Tap, this constitutes abuse.
Many restaurants throughout Philadelphia and the US have already dropped foie gras and/or pledged not to serve it. Many of these establishments formerly used Hudson Valley foie gras, and came to the conclusion that all foie gras production, including Hudson Valley’s, is too cruel to support. I urge you to do the same.
Sincerely,
–
http://baliwhat.wordpress.com/
By: baliwhat on November 20, 2007
at 1:02 am
This is crazy. “The funnel used to feed a grain mash to the birds uses gravity only.” The ducks are still being fed with a funnel. That seems pretty absurd.
By: rideataxia on November 20, 2007
at 2:01 am
Many restaurants dropped foie gras to avoid controversy. One simply renamed it to “pate” on their menu and the protests there ended.
It was the campaign of misinformation and intimidation that galvanized us to publicly defend the farm that has supplied us with duck for many years.
If you know the facts, and you feel strongly about this issue, then I respect you for taking a stand.
-William
By: william reed on November 20, 2007
at 12:44 pm
Thanks Kyle (rideataxia) for pointing out that it’s still force-feeding, whether they use gravity or not- I’m not even sure where that point came from, as I’ve never heard it discussed. And if, as William says, “Many restaurants dropped foie gras to avoid controversy,” well, good! It’s really too bad that they feel they should defend Hudson Valley foie gras, as it is shameful and is costing them business.
By: baliwhat on November 20, 2007
at 3:26 pm
“…it is more distressing to take a rectal temperature in a cat.”
http://www.avma.org/onlnews/javma/sep05/050901q.asp
I would guess the american veterinarian medical association to be a less biased source than industry or peta.
Wouldn’t activist-hours be better spent protesting supporters of enormous, chemical-laden, mono-cultured industrial farms?
-Matt
By: Matt on November 26, 2007
at 8:41 pm
Matt, regardless of what the AVMA says, I (along with many, many others) still think foie gras is wrong. As for your suggestion as to how activists might better spend their time, how about you go protest that? I’ll join you when Philly restaurants stop selling foie gras.
By: baliwhat on November 26, 2007
at 11:22 pm
After reading through this article, I feel that I need more info. Can you suggest some more resources please?
By: Random T. on April 22, 2009
at 2:06 am