Lot’s of queries are coming in about Colleen’s Bistro. For those who missed the story while FD was gone, Colleen left the bistro. The owners have changed the name to Le Pigeon, and hired a new chef – Gabriel Rucker, most recently from Gotham Bldg. Tavern – to replace her.
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Pascal Sauton, the feisty proprietor of Carafe Bistro, seems to have had a visit from the animal rights people. He was nice enough to answer their comment cards with an open letter:
“Dear Animal Right Activist,
Thank you for stopping by at Carafe last Saturday and for filling out our comment cards. We appreciate that you took the time to express your opinion.
However, you have expressed it to the wrong people… You should have done a little bit of research before wasting your time. You see, we are probably the most stubborn people in this country’s restaurant industry! We love foie gras – it is delicious – and we love the people who produce it. They are passionate, respectful of the animals and very ethical in their way of producing it. We know: we visited the farm.
Did you?
Just so you know, we will NEVER remove Foie Gras from our menu. We sell about 200 orders of it a month! There are too many people enjoying it who come to our restaurant just for that. The 8 comment cards you filled Saturday are the ONLY one I ever received in 3 years of business compared to hundreds we received to thank us for serving Foie Gras!
And we boil lobsters alive and serve oysters on the half shell too…
You are wasting your time here and you are not welcomed in our restaurant. The more publicity you create about Foie Gras, the more we sell. You do me a favor!
Thank you…
Have a nice summer,
Pascal Sauton and Julie Hunter
Proprietors
Carafe Bistro
200 SW Market St
Portland, OR 97201
www.carafebistro.com
“Long Live Foie Gras!”
alan bluehole says
I like Carafe, but Pascal perpetuates stereotypes many Americans have about the French. It’s too bad; they’ve always been so nice when I’ve been in France.
Ellie says
Yes!
cuisinebonnefemme says
Maybe the Hebb can use his magic power of b.s. and get the Ace Hotel people to buy the Gotham? Snort. Pascal: Vous êtes très drôle. Bonne réponse!
Apollo says
I heard that Sonoma Foie Gras is going to stop producing because of pressure from Whole Foods. Is there any truth to this rumor? I heard it from the guys at Viande (3rd hand of course) so that makes me believe it.
Food Dude says
Apollo – I know people there, am checking on the story.
sidemeat says
I wish I could fall so far as to travel the country in an airstream and work on my book.(wouldn’t be worth it if I had to burn a bunch of people tho)
KevinS says
The Sonoma Foie Gras story has been widely reported in Northern CA. I saw the story in the
SJ Mercury News at least a couple of weeks before
WF said it would no longer sell live lobsters.
Marshall Manning says
I wonder how many people who are against eating lobsters frequently kill spiders, ants, and flies? Lobsters are no further up on the evolutionary ladder.
Pam says
I actually admire Pascal for having an opinion (actually MANY opinions)and sticking to it in the face of popular trends and opposition. I dunno, is that stereotypically French? Yeah, probably.
Daaaaave says
I believe Bourdain confirmed the Sonoma FG story at the In Good Taste reading.
Brett says
> Pascal perpetuates stereotypes many Americans have about the French
What are you talking about? That was a very un-French response — he went on the offensive! No cheese-eating surrender monkeys there. Love his response. Vive la foie gras.
nancy says
The New York Times wrote about the Whole Foods decision about a month ago, as well.
As for Mr. Hebberoy: one must not underestimate the lustrous appeal of the media-darling, and for a little while and in the pond that is Portland, no one shined harder than he. People on down the food chain might assume he’ll reflect well on them. I’m not inferring the hotel is looking to hitch its wagon to a star (however tarnished), but they must feel he’s of some value. So, what might it be?
sidemeat says
I wonder how many people eat spiders, ants and flies? Where one draws their line is a funny buisiness. I have no interest in lobster because in my eyes it is a giant bug, I have minimal difficulty eating a steak but have no interest in organ meats. Julia Child said something to the effect that it’s all the same thing, it just comes in different shapes. I think that everything between eating vegan and a Ted Nugent carnivorism is a compromise of some sort. If it tries to crawl out of the pot while I’m cooking it I’m not too interested. But, that’s the line I draw for myself.
nancy says
We have two steaks in the fridge for tonight and I have to stop myself from eating them raw. And I adore foie gras, and spleen, and sweetbreads, and have been known to suck the marrow out of a T-bone until everyone else at the table is embarrased. But if I were to draw a line, it might be at casu marzu, or Sardinian maggot cheese, wherein larvae are introduced into a wheel of pecorino that is then allowed to ripen, and during which the larvae gorge themselves on the cheese and essentially liquify the interior. After, I don’t know, however long it takes to get a cheese nice and maggoty, the cheese is cut, and the liquid maggot interior, called “lagrima,” spread on crackers. If I were sitting at table with a bunch of Sardinians, I’d probably bite, but… uh.
Djonn says
Tom Paxton told a story some years ago when he was in town for a concert — he’d been recruited by some vegetarian friends to write a protest song. Unfortunately for the vegetarians, Tom is a self-described carnivore, and so the song he came up with was Don’t Slay That Potato….
I like Tom Paxton.
mczlaw says
How can you even think about eating a food that involves the obvious force-feeding of insect larvae. Maggots are people too, ya know. I’m on the phone with IDA and PETA right now. . .
–mcz
Speaking of maggots. . .oh never mind.
J Eisenhart says
Maggot Pecorino? Yeah, I’d do it in a sec.
atlas says
Maybe PETA should redirect their fundamentalist ways and begin the attack on all things soy… you see, when the soy bean is harvested thousands of rodents and birds are killed.
Also, I would like to highlight that by donning some gore-tex garmet rather than say a leather jacket or even (gasp) a fur coat, that they are contributing to a severe spike in pollution resulting from the factories that create the material they so piously wear. Not to mention these factories have been known to decimate the avian population in the surrounding areas.
I wonder if the PETA people are aware of what they contribute to by eating so much soy based product and wearing what they wear.
As they claim to be people of great compassion and intelligence, I can only suspect that they do but are more concerned with their larger goal of making people adhere to their value system concerning this matter.
I wonder what else of their values they would like to impose upon other people?
pollo elastico says
Pascal’s letter was pretty damn funny. Especially the part where he said “delicious.”
Pork Cop says
My rule of thumb: I won’t eat anything that cast’s a shadow. Simple really.You should all be like me.
sidemeat says
Happy news for chef Paul. Even during the most horrific times a balvo I never saw him lose his cool or treat anyone with anything but respect. His
professionalism was a marked contrast to the executive chef. Some other restaurant will be fortunate to have him.
fathom says
I don’t eat anything with eyes. That’s why I find frites so offensive. Don’t even get me started on aioli…
pascal says
“Stop Tofu Abuse…Eat Foie Gras”
Apollo says
I have two of those shirts Pascal. I like to wear them when I go order foie gras at restaurants while they are being protested…
pascal says
Sonoma Foie Gras isn’t going out of business. They did their homework and are back on the distributing market. I do have SFG back on my menu.
I hope Whole Foods will get hurt by the lawsuit.
atlas says
That is great news Pascal!
Diner says
So I say, if you don’t want to buy strawberries because migrant workers harvest them, don’t. And if you don’t want to eat foie gras for some reason or another, don’t. But please don’t try to impose your value system on anyone else. It’s rude. Plus trying to destroy another person’s livelihood based on your personal bias is downright mean. Live and let live. Make your own personal choices. Myself, I think I’m gonna head to Fenouil this Sunday and maybe have some foie or some escargot. Has anyone out there yet considered the fate of the snails? If I order escargot should I wear a Kevlar vest?
Marshall Manning says
Diner, you hit the nail on the head. Don’t like foie, fine…then don’t eat it.
The problem isn’t just personal beliefs, though. These organizations (PETA, MADD, etc.) have to try to come up with new things in order to sustain themselves. MADD couldn’t be happy with getting blood alcohol levels reduced…once that was done they had to keep going. And the PETA/vegan wackos will be the same way. If they get foie gras banned, they’ll go onto something else in order to keep their organization going. No one is ever happy just accomplishing their initial purpose.
sidemeat says
oh, wait, I think it’s more difficult than that.I want berries, I just don’t want to have abused people picking/processing them. Sure, that will cost more. I want my occasional burger,I just prefer that the poor animal didn’t spend it’s life up to it’s knees in it’s own shit on some feedlot only to be slaughtered in a uber slaughterhouse by abused workers. The nature of enlightenment is that once you have seen the light you have to shine it on the un-enlightened. That’s why those watchtower buggers bother you on saturday morning. Eat well, we’re all food for worms.
Chef Bacon says
Way to go Pascal! Stick to your guns.
When did food that does nothing more than provide gastronomic happiness become a controlled substance?
Submitted for your approval: PETA=People Eating Tasty Animals?
thanks but no thanks says
Little late jumping in on this, but here’s my two cents . . .
Cuisinebonnefemme says, “Maybe the Hebb can use his magic power of b.s. and get the Ace Hotel people to buy the Gotham?”
Not so much. If my memory serves me, the Ace people are the Brazen Bean people and it was THEIR original plan to occupy the Gotham space before it was ever Gotham anything (coffee shop, tavern, whatever), way back when Ripe was just doing catering and home suppers and didn’t even have official suppers in the supper space. The Brazen Bean people threw a big ground-breaking party and made the mistake of inviting the landlord of the building. Landlord fella, being the good upstanding developer he is, saw all sorts of unsavory goingson at said party and pulled the lease. So yeah, if that rumor is true, the Ace people will probably not be buying the Gotham if the building owner is still the same.
But I may have my food and drink and white powder people all mixed up . . .
Food Dude says
thanks but no thanks – not likely, since Gotham Building Tavern is being reopened under Gotham Tavern by someone else. The building owner is still the same.
mitzie says
Wait, is the ace hotel the same as the one in Seattle or not? What does the Brazen Bean (cringe) have to do with it? If it is sister to the Seattle hotel, I have no idea why they’d need the Hebberoytor. Surely they know his name is mud in PDX right now. It only takes a Google. They’ll lure plenty from their already great press.
Food Dude says
Mitzie: yes, the same group as in Seattle. I’ve never heard the Brazen Bean connection before it was posted here.