Foie Gras Farm

Le Ferme du Boué is a small-scale business specializing in duck products.
There is a restaurant with a fixed menu, a garden that raises 100% of the food for the restaurant,
and an endless supply of ducks to make rillettes, foie gras, confit and more.

The first building you come to is the restaurant.

Jehanne Rignault explains a little about ducks and the products she makes.

Instead of selling entire ducks at a Marché au Gras, Jehanne
turns each duck into something scrumptious.

Back patio of the restaurant.

Along with the lovely main house on the property, there are many gites that
are rented out for the summer holidays. Heading to the countryside
is quite the popular thing to do in France...gimme somma that fresh air!

Guests on the farm can relax by the beautiful blue pool,
or head out to the big pond to fish in the afternoon sunshine.

There are not only ducks, but cows, sheep, chickens and pigs here on the farm.

Oink, oink.

Small, but immaculately tended garden.

Since this is a fois gras farm, force feeding IS practiced, but it
is only for the last 14 days of the duck's life. They start with this cup, the actual
amount a duck would eat in a day, and then increase the amount over the course of
the 14 days. The ducks are hand-fed slightly cooked corn and oil, so the corn is
relatively soft and goes down easily.

The process of making foie gras isn't as evil as you may have thought!
If you are still wary, read up on our beloved factory farm system....
chances are you'll end up preferring the farm-raised foie.

It just so happened that the day of our visit a large shipment of ducklings
was set to be delivered. Lucky, lucky us.
They arrived in a huge truck filled only with these few small,
cardboard boxes..hmmm......

Et Voila! Apparently 24-hour-old ducklings are more durable than we think and
can simply be dumped right out of the boxes onto clean hay.

350 ducklings to be exact, and MAN were they adorable.
They stay inside for about 2-3 weeks so as not to catch a cold outside,
and then out they go to play in the fields. Free range babies.

Lovely visit to a wonderful, well-run operation.