Facebook "you can no longer send messages to Mario Batali. he's serving roasted ortolan" my dinner without MB at Waffle House

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"you can no longer send messages to Mario Batali. he's serving roasted ortolan" 

my dinner 

without MB 

at Waffle House

I thought they were fried, not roasted. The French are truly the Chinese of Europe.

The book "HEAT" by Bill Buford mentions Mario Batali's first job serving roasted ortolan

Mitterrand's last meal

Is there a source for this?

Somehow I find it hard to believe that a dying man could eat ortolans.

Michael Paterniti in the May 1998
issue of Esquire; there are numerous citations of it online but I don't
think the article itself is.

It was also discussed at length in an issue of NPRs this American Life taped in early December 2007.

Also Weekend Edition, Googling

"François Mitterrand last meal" gives a wealth of links. 

Conservation

fr:Ortolan says that it is protected in Europe, but this article says it is of least concern

There's no conflict there, most birds in Europe are protected to a greater or lesser extent, even quarry species have specified hunting periods.

The Birdlife International criteria are quite strict - to even be vulnerable, a species must have a small population, limited range, or be declining at an alarming rate.

Ortolan is still a numerous an widespread bird, and is common around the Med.

Jimfbleak.talk. 7:00, 17 December 2006 (UTC)

"The 1992 estimation for the French population is 15,000 pairs," shortly followed by:

"Hunting (in particular in Landes) is responsible
for taking about 50,000 birds per year."

As Landes is an area in
France,

I don't see how these numbers can be accurate.

It would be
useful if the hunting figure were dated, but one finds it highly
unlikely that the population could have risen from 15,000 pairs to
something large enough to support that much take, even in 18 years.

Perhaps it would add clarity by changing it to "Hunting in Europe (in particular in Landes)..."?

Urban hunting

I've
(re) added a reference to the Urban Hunting article in The Stranger
where the quote about eating Ortolan appears to be taken from.

It
struck me as odd to have this quote lifted from the article without any
sort of citation visible.

Without proper attribution, who can say where
the text came from?

I've removed the reference because the author quoted claims he has no expertise in this matter whatsoever.

I've overexerted the quote because it is utter fabrication 

Where-can-I-go-what-can-I-do-to-eat-ortolan-bunting

I should look up that Top Gear episode that is mentioned in the
latter the stranger article

(it might have been the Clarkson "touring Europe" program he did instead of top gear).

I definitely remember it as
well, perhaps we can use that to source.

The documentary/program was called "Meet the Neighbours"

(episode France).

I think it will be difficult to get a hold of, but perhaps i run into it somewhere..

Found it.

http://www.tv-links.co.uk/video/9/7198/11592/70928/98897

Ignore the Star Wars intro thing, it's the ripper having fun, the rest of the episode is just fine.

This article is discussed in the Seattle weekly "The Stranger"  here: 121165

thestranger.com/seattle/Content?oid=297191