On Pigeon Eating
Diary, Friday 6th June 2025
A number of restaurants in Madrid’s China town have been shut down by the health authorities for serving pigeon in place of Hoisin duck. This is unpalatable to Spanish urbanites who find the practice of pigeon eating to be a bizarre and oriental custom, comparable to foot-binding or the consumption of dog. All the better for me. I have since found that ordering the “duck” in practically any Chinese eatery (while winking conspicuously at the waitress) will fetch me for seven euros what in my Highgate butcher’s would have cost me fifteen — cooked and served, no less, on a bed of rice and drizzled in a red jus. In the places I most often frequent I have come to be known as “el palomero,” or “the pigeon man” and enjoy priority seating. The whole thing has been such a roaring success that I am inspired to explore the other culinary secrets of Madrid’s vibrant immigrant community; tomorrow I dine at a Peruvian where I will be ordering the “roasted suckling pig”.
