Appears in
Oxford Companion to Food

By Alan Davidson

Published 2014

  • About

dog the supreme example of animals which are regarded in the western world not just as pets but as true companions, in activity and thought, for human beings, and consequently not to be even imagined as potential food. So strong are the feelings of revulsion which the mere mention of such an idea can provoke that some writers have excused themselves from even mentioning the subject. This taboo is almost as strong as that governing cannibalism and, generally speaking, very much stronger than that affecting the horse (another animal ‘companion’). Feelings of hesitation or sadness over eating a lamb or a young pig, even though these other animals may be treated as pets and show signs of intelligence, are on a different plane. Although they may occasionally be overwhelming for individuals, they lack the strength and near universality in the western world of the feelings about dogs (and cats). Perhaps it was as a supreme example of Albion’s perfidy that Savary asserted in his Dictionnaire universel (1741) that English brewers achieved the special flavour of their porter by adding the flesh of a flayed dog to their vats.