NEW YORK • French restaurant Lutece served it seared, with dark chocolate sauce and bitter orange marmalade. Le Cirque offered it in classic terrine form, but also served it with rabbit and bacon and made it the scene-stealer in a ravioli dish.
But Lutece closed in New York in 2004 and Le Cirque shut its last Manhattan location in 2017.
And foie gras, the calling card of fine French dining, is about to follow suit.
The New York City Council overwhelmingly passed legislation on Wednesday that will ban the sale of foie gras in the city - one of the largest markets in the United States - beginning in 2022.
New York City will join California in prohibiting the sale of foie gras, the fattened liver of a duck or goose, over animal cruelty concerns.
"New York is the capital of dining in the world. How is it possible that New York doesn't have foie gras?" said Marco Moreira, executive chef and owner of Tocqueville, an acclaimed French restaurant near Union Square, which offers an appetiser of foie gras from the Hudson Valley. "What's next? No more veal? No more mushrooms?"
Most foie gras is produced through a process known as gavage, in which ducks are force-fed a fatty corn-based mixture that engorges their livers.
The process requires tubes to be inserted into a duck's throat for a 20-day feeding regimen, swelling the liver to up to 10 times its normal size. The procedure can leave ducks too big to walk or even breathe before they are slaughtered, animal activists say.
Ms Carlina Rivera, a Manhattan councilwoman who sponsored the foie gras legislation, said her Bill "tackles the most inhumane process" in the commercial food industry.
"This is one of the most violent practices and it's done for a purely luxury product," she said.
Foie gras farmers say the forced feedings are not cruel and that the claims of torture are exaggerated. They say there is a bias against foie gras because it is a luxury product.
Other countries, including India, Israel and Britain, have banned the sale or production of foie gras.
But New York was seen as a critical battleground, where an expense-account culture of extravagance has fed demand for foie gras for decades. That tradition, however, has given way to an increasingly progressive City Council.
The Bill bars the sale of foie gras produced by "force-feeding birds", with each violation punishable by a US$2,000 (S$2,700) fine.
But not all foie gras comes from ducks or geese that have been force-fed, and determining whether foie gras was illegally produced may present an enforcement challenge.
Under the law, it will be assumed that all foie gras has come from duck or geese that have been force-fed unless "documentary" evidence is provided to the contrary.
About 1,000 New York City restaurants have foie gras on their menus.
But a greater impact may be felt on the farms north of New York City that produce foie gras.
Hudson Valley Foie Gras and La Belle Farm in Sullivan County say they employ about 400 people and that New York City makes up about 30 per cent of their business.
Hudson Valley - which slaughters 800 ducks a day - said it sold US$15 million worth of foie gras last year.
A foie gras liver that weighs 90g can sell for US$125 and the bones and feathers from foie gras ducks are used in other products such as dog food and coats, said Mr Sergio Saravia, a founder of La Belle and head of the Catskill Foie Gras Collective.
"California and New York were our biggest markets, so this is devastating," he said, adding that his farm has lost US$50,000 a week in revenue from the loss of the California market. "It's going to make it difficult to stay afloat."
Restaurateurs such as Moreira saw the ban differently from animal rights supporters.
"We will suffer," he said. "It's like taking letters from the alphabet; they will take something out of our kitchen vocabulary that's integral to the restaurant."
Dan Williams, executive sous chef at Marea, on Central Park South, called foie gras a "craftsmanship ingredient" that takes time to learn how to harvest and prepare.
"It's not like deep-fried shrimp," he said. "You have to have talent to put it on the menu."
NYTIMES
