The foie. A millennial pleasure

One of the products most select and appreciated by the gourmets, the foie gras, this particular development of the livers of duck and goose, it is a gastronomic delight that has come to us, with inevitable ups and downs, from the most remote antiquity and any table keeps on being capable of ennoblecer and to heighten the most varied makings without losing never his personality.



The origin of the Foie gras gets lost in the sleep of the times. They might be the Egyptians, that 3.000 years before J.C. were already dominating the skills to put on weight to the waterfowls (geese, broke, etc.) with dry figs, or the Hebrews, who learned the secrets of this work for his years of slavery along with the Nile; but with almost all safety, they were the Greeks, and later the Romans, who, in addition to the development of the Mediterranean culture, initiated the consumption of this delightful delicacy, along with other sophisticated preparations, which in many cases have not come until our days.

The fall of the Roman Empire makes to eliminate almost completely the foie gras consumption in Europe, diminishing only to Byzantium, the last stronghold of the Roman culture, and some few producing places of birds, where the tradition survives but practically concentrated on the familiar consumption. In this moment they are the Arabs, sovereigns of the Mediterranean basin, who support his consumption until the XVth century, when the gastronomic customs in our continent experience a renaissance. Anyway, the conservation difficulties do that the foie gras is still a product concentrated on his places of production or private room only to the best tables of noblemen and kings.

It is from the XVIIIth century when the foie gras will initiate his authentic expansion. The producers begin fattening the birds with corn, which has already been implanted in the whole continent after his arrival of America, guaranteeing an ideal development and a uniformity of texture and flavor of the product and some Alsatian confectioners, begin preparing it and commercializing it in his establishments, being still today a specialty much appreciated in Alsace. Already in the XIXth century, with the arrival of the industrialization, there begin arising companies that devote themselves to the foie gras production in important quantities, improving the conservation systems and taking it to all the corners of the world.



The production

The securing of the foie gras is only the reproduction of a natural process that registers in migratory birds like the goose or the duck. Before tackling his long flight, these animals are overfed and accumulate in his liver the fats that will allow them to survive during the trip.

The man the only thing that it does is to force in the farms this sobrealimentación submitting to the birds immobilized to a diet of corn boiled with fat that accelerates the development of the liver and his special flavor and aroma awards him. Once his maximum development reaches the liver, they are extracted from the animal, which is assined to his commercialization in fresh or elaborated, are drained and the nerves are eliminated before proceeding to his cooking with a treatment that guarantees the hygienic and sanitary conditions of the product.

The biggest world producer, and simultaneously the first foie gras consumer, is France, continued by Hungary and Israel, which also they are the principal providers of foie of goose of the Gallic industrialists, although in the last years an important increase of producing countries has registered, reaching the fifty some nations as exotic as China or Madagascar, between which there is naturally Spain, where principally it takes place foie of duck.

Already inside France, which processes enough more foie gras of the one that really takes place in the country, the first producing region of foie of duck is The Moorlands, area in which there is developing a quality label that guarantees the origin of his foie gras of duck. Curiously there was in this region where the best goose species developed for foie, the gray goose, which now grows up in two regions that dispute the leadership as for the goose foie gras; the Périgord, where craftsmen live together some of the most important signatures of the world with producers completely and there gets together in multiple occasions with other big product of this ground, the black truffle, and the Alsace, cradle of the modern foie gras and where it is prepared by a flavor and completely particular aroma thanks to a skillful spices combination.



The varieties

The foie gras proceeds only and exclusively of livers of goose or duck, and here it is where the polemic appears between gourmets and gourmets, with staunch defenders of one or other. Although respecting the differences and particular characteristics of each of them, it is possible to make sure that both are between the food more exquisite that at present can be tasted.

The goose foie gras is bigger, with a weight between 500 and 900 in fresh air and a form of outlines rounded with two lobes of practically the same size. His color is pink and it has a thin and greasy texture and a soft and subtle flavor. For his part, the duck foie gras has a triangular form with a lobe much bigger than other and a yellow color. In crude oil his weight ranges between 300 and 600 grams and his flavor and aroma they turn out to be much stronger and penetrating, with a valuable acidity point. Anyway, the most important difference is in the percentage of fat that it detaches during his accused, while a goose foie does not lose any more than 3 % of his fat during the cooking, the duck foie can come to exudar up to 50 % of the fat.

The making of terrinas or the use of foie gras in the preparation of numerous culinary specialties, since it is a product that it joins perfectly with infinity of ingredients, is necessary raw livers that for the long time could only be obtained in the baby's areas of these birds and in some few very specializing establishments, considering his short useful life. Now, thanks to the use of packed to the gap and the modern conservation techniques, it can meet a lot of major facility and has happened to turn into essential element in infinity of culinary creations much appreciated by the most delicate palates.

As for the traditional ways of commercialization of the foie gras three big blocks can be established according to the temperatures of cooking and the time of conservation. First of all there is the Fresh Foie gras, which has been cooked to a temperature that in the heart of the piece reaches them 65-70°C and has a life of up to 21 days to a maximum temperature of 2°C. In the same paragraph "Foie is included in Tronchon", a liver desnervado and wrapped in a cloth that is cooked in a broth of meat or of bird so that it absorbs his aromas, and the foie cooked to the gap that has a much more long conservation.

Others two paragraphs are the Foie gras Mi-Cuit, or in semiconserve, which has surrendered to a cooking that takes the center of the piece up to a temperature between 70 and 85°C and has a conservation that ranges between 3 weeks and 6 months to 2°C, according to the reached temperature and the cooking time; and the Foie gras in Conserve, which is sterilized inside canisters a temperature of 105-115°C and, for legislation, it has an expiration of 4 years, although the big foie gras degustadores tend to keep it during a variable time since inside his packing, as it happens in the wines, the foie gras evolves on having absorbed the fat that has lost during the cooking. Also, from the foie gras many other products are prepared as parfaits, pâtés, stuffed games or mousses and it is even used like minority ingredient in other makings and specialties that remain heightened and revalued by this millennial delicacy.