Hamborgarafabrikkan Takes Foie Gras Off The Menu

Popular hamburger joint, Hamborgarafabrikkan (The Hamburger Factory) has taken foie gras off their menu following a complaint on their Facebook page, reports RÚV.

The complaint asked the restaurant if they weren’t willing to stop participating in and promoting “one of the most damaging animal abuse practices in the world by taking it off the menu.”

“French duck liver is definitely a very controversial food and we knew that when we put it on our menu,” said restaurant owner Jóhannes Ásbjörnsson. “The pairing of beef and duck liver is popular and accessible in restaurants across the world. However, in light of this solid point made by our customer and the fact that duck liver does not sell very well at the Hamburger Factory, we have decided to remove it from our menu.”

The decision is welcomed by Guðný Nielsen, who sits on the board of Velbú, an organisation promoting the ethical treatment of animals. Guðný told RÚV however, that it seems the decision was influenced more by the fact that foie gras wasn’t selling well, than some ethical concern over the way it is produced.

Around 80% of the world’s foie gras is produced in France. The geese are force fed using a funnel fitted with a long tube (20–30 cm long), which pumps the feed into the animal’s oesophagus.

Modern feeding systems usually use a tube fed by a pneumatic pump fed via a slit, cut in the goose’s oesophagus. This way, the feeding time per duck is only 2-3 seconds.