Cooking show host suspended

I thought this was amusing.
Excerpt:
"ROME — Italian state TV has suspended a cooking show host who shocked the nation by saying cat stew is a Tuscan delicacy he swears he has enjoyed many times.

RAI TV confirmed on Wednesday that it had suspended Beppe Bigazzi, the 77-year-old host of a popular morning program that offers food tips and recipes in a country fiercely proud of its cuisine.

When his 27-year-old female co-host looked stunned as Bigazzi said he has eaten cat stew "many times," the white-haired grandfather figure defended his tastes.

"Why, people maybe don't eat rabbit, chicken, pigeon?" Bigazzi said. He could have added horse meat, which many butchers and supermarket meat departments stock.

"Who's not fat, kills the cat," is how Bigazzi began his lighthearted prattle about cat stew.

Bigazzi claimed cat stew was a Tuscan specialty near the Arno River valley, but co-host Elisa Isoardi looked so embarrassed she ducked behind a cart of fresh salad greens whose healthy virtues the two were supposed to be chatting about.

"Cat, soaked for three days in the running water of a stream" in Tuscany "comes out with its meat white, and I assure you -- I have eaten it many times -- that it is a delicacy," Bigazzi continued.

His critics included Health Ministry Undersecretary Francesca Martini.

"Cats are pets protected by law," Martini noted, specifically against "cruelty, maltreatment and abandonment."

She lamented in a statement issued by the Health Ministry that Bigazzi's advocating cat stew "hurts sensibility, which is fortunately steadily growing, of citizens toward animals.""
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http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/unleash ... -stew.html

In all fairness to the cooking show host, who is old enough to have lived through WWII, eating stray cats was how Rome survived WWII. The cats are now protected because they saved the population.

I actually first heard about that during my first visit to Italy, back in 1966. I was amazed, and a little horrified, at how many stray cats there were around many of the ruins.

Just to make sure our guide wasn't telling a tale, I did a quick search, and loads of articles report the same thing. Here's one example: http://articles.latimes.com/1987-02-15/ ... stray-cats

Yeah, unfortunately most people live in an insulated microcosm and aren't very open-minded when it comes to things that they can get emotionally involved with. Like their pets.

A comment I saw elsewhere implied that people are frightened that the cat-eating public will become crazed zombies and go after their pets instead of strays. I'm mildly curious about, well, just about anything I haven't eaten yet (I draw the line at alive, making an exception for bivalves,) but I find this level of panic quite silly.

I recently saw an episode of Dirty Jobs where they shadowed Miami's "Chicken Busters," a recently-cut department dedicated to the capture of feral domestic chickens. If I could get exercise and free-range chicken for free, I'd have no problem chasing birds around the neighborhood, former pets or no - and, frankly, that bunny in the backyard better keep his mitts off my Swiss Chard...