Death of a tradition

Well once again the zealots of the EEC have killed off a tradition that has been going on for at least 200 odd years. Every year the local hunters ( the french eat anything they can shoot) put on a huge meal for all at a moderate cost. This meal is to celebrate the bounty that the season gave to them and of course would include, wild boar, deer, rabbit, hare etc etc. Now all this comes to an end this year as new laws on food consumption for the public health come into force.

As of January 2006 all animals killed and destined for human consumption at a PAYING meal MUST be taken to the local abbatoir for inspection to be pronounced fit to eat. This test consists of inspecting the liver to see if it is healthy!! If it passes then the meat gets the stamp of approval. The fact that the hunters have been doing this for years counts for nothing and nobody can remember anybody ever getting ill through eating the food, maybe from over indulgence of the wine but not the food!

The meat then has to be superfast frozen to -30° for 24hrs and then put in cold storage until required. When required someone has to collect it, sign for it and accept responsibility in case anything should go wrong and someone is ill after the meal. This opens up all sorts of possibilities of wrongful claims for food poisoning if certain types of people thought it would get them money!! Naturally nobody wants to take on that responsibility and so the last meal of this type will take place in August.

What a bloody shame!!