Get saucy with author Mark Caro at M�nage � Foie this Sunday

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Get saucy with author Mark Caro at M�nage � Foie this Sunday

POSTED: Tuesday, March 31, 2009, 5:30 PM
Simon & Schuster

Everyone who missed Foie Gras Week's $5 plates will get a second shot at liver love this Sunday, April 5, when The Foie Gras Wars (Simon & Schuster) author Mark Caro visits London Grill for an evening meet-and-greet, complete with foie, beer and sauternes specials and representatives from controversial producers and sellers Hudson Valley Foie Gras and D'Artagnan.

London Grill owner Terry Berch McNally and chef-owner Michael McNally led the charge against Philadelphia animal-rights protesters, who began picketing restaurants that serve foie gras in mid-2007. Hugs for Puppies and Nick Cooney, who originally took credit for forcing restaurant owners to remove fattened duck liver from their menus, have renamed themselves Humane League of Philadelphia and no longer use public protest as their main tool. This year's Foie Gras Week, compared to the first iteration in 2008, was quite peaceful.

The hotly contested issue has since cooled in Philadelphia, and Caro's book devotes two full chapters to the charged debate of 2007-08. Simon & Schuster's Web site describes Caro's book and how he was thrown into the maelstrom:

In announcing that he had stopped serving the fattened livers of force-fed ducks and geese at his world-renowned restaurant, influential chef Charlie Trotter heaved a grenade into a simmering food fight, and the Foie Gras Wars erupted. He said his morally minded menu revision was meant merely to raise consciousness, but what was he thinking when he also suggested -- to Chicago Tribune reporter Mark Caro -- that a rival four-star chef 's liver be eaten as "a little treat"? The reaction to Caro's subsequent front-page story was explosive, as Trotter's sizable hometown moved to ban the ancient delicacy known as foie gras while an international array of activists, farmers, chefs and politicians clashed forcefully and sometimes violently over whether fattening birds for the sake of scrumptious livers amounts to ethical agriculture or torture.

Chicago has since reversed the ban. Whether you're for, against or simply curious, meeting the author of The Foie Gras Wars should add a little spice to an already hot pot.

Sun., April 5, 6-8 p.m, London Grill, 2301 Fairmount Ave., 215-978-4545, londongrill.com

RELATED: Foie Gras Week scheduled for March 13-19 [9Mar09]

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