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A top French fine dining restaurant in London is set to go vegan.
Gauthier Soho used to serve more than 20kg of foie gras every week a few years ago. Now it serves a vegan tasting menu which is becoming increasingly popular.
Chef and Owner Alexis Gauthier is gradually shifting the menu to be in line with his own vegan lifestyle. The menu is currently 75 percent plant-based, and still features cod, pork and duck.
PETA
Gauthier ditched animal products following protests by animal rights charity PETA in October 2015 – which ultimately led to him going vegan.
Speaking at the Restaurant Congress event in London, he said: “[PETA activists] were saying I was a horrible person because I was using foie gras.
“I thought about it and started to listen to what people had to say about the suffering of animals and thought ‘what am I here for? Is this really the future?’”
The chef recently teamed up with foodie duo BOSH! to share his vegan ‘faux gras’ recipe
No impact
Saying he didn’t want to keep ‘ignoring what’s happening’ in animal agriculture, he added: “I decided in our kitchen we would not be creating any more new dishes involving meat and fish or things with eggs and butter. The pure creativity has to lie with veganism.
“Within 18 months to two years, we will hopefully be 100 percent vegan.
“People will know there will be no impact on animals when they come into our restaurant. We are going from serving 20kg of foie gras every week five years ago to having no impact on animals, which I think is wonderful.”
