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The technique of producing foie gras may actually go as far back as the ancient Egyptians. Researchers have discovered painting on tombs dating as far back from the fourth and fifth Egyptian dynasties, showing farmers holding geese by the neck and feeding them packed balls of grain, to increase their weight quickly. This method, called gavage, has basically gone unchanged, and its principles are still used today. It has been theorized that a farmer in Egypt had a flock of geese, and for some reason, one bird aquired an enormous appetite. When that goose was finally killed by the farmer for consumption, the farmer discovered that this goose had an enormous liver that he found to be quite delicious. (Gascony 5) Foie gras also was utilized by the ancient Romans. Evidence can be found in their poems and literature, which featured the fattened livers of geese. A Roman that has been said to have advanced the technique to produce foie gras was Consul Quintus Caecilius Metullus Pius Scripio. He fed his geese a diet of figs to give the livers and meat extra sweetness. Half a century later, Roman, Marcus Gavius Apicius, applied the technique to ducks and pigs. (Gascony 5) Foie gras was continued to be produced throughout the years, and by the fifteenth century it had become a thriving industry. The boom first began with geese, and then it later ducks. It was not until 1747 that the first published recipe using foie gras was produced. It was called “Pate de foie gras”. It consisted of fresh sliced foie gras, seasoning it with truffles and baking it in puff pastry. This recipe was published in Amsterdam. (Gascony 5) After Christopher Columbus returned from the new world, he brought with him corn. A new type of cereal was born. Not only that, since corn had replaced figs in south western French diets, the entire region turned to corn production, to become the known as the “foie gras region”. Later, the development of sterilization allowed foie gras to extend to the rest of France, which today is known for its excellence of its foie gras. (The Impressionists Foie Gras) Still to this day, United States law prohibits the importation of fresh meat, so foie gras of any kind from the European nations is unknown. Imported foie gras can only be purchased in can form. “In the New York Catskill Mountains at a farm called Common Wealth Enterprises Products Corporation, scientists have cross bread the Pekin and the Muscovy duck to yield moulards (Gascony 6).” This is the only combination that was found to produce fattened livers that equal the size and quality of those ducks bred in France.
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