Michaelmas a day for goose

During the Middle Ages, Michaelmas became a great religious feast and many popular traditions grew up around the day.

Coinciding with the end of harvest, the feast was celebrated with a traditional, well-fattened Michaelmas goose, also known as the "green goose" as the birds would have been fattened almost entirely on gleanings from the harvest field stubbles and grass - in contrast to the Christmas goose finished primarily on wheat. They are a leaner bird than the Christmas goose which develops more fat with the cold weather.

According to tradition, when rents were due at Michaelmas tenant farmers south of the border would often present their landlord with a goose which became associated with guarding against financial woes. Folklore declares: "Eat a goose on Michaelmas Day, want not for money all year long."

Michaelmas coincides with the autumn equinox, historically the day of the year on which the serfs of the manor elected a reeve. The reeve was expected to ensure all other serfs started work on time and that no one was cheating the lord of the manor out of any money.

Although Michaelmas Day is a religious festival it is also called "Devil's Spit Day" in some parts of England.

Legend has it that on Michaelmas Day, the end of harvest and the beginning of autumn, the Devil was thrown out of heaven and landed on a prickly bramble bush. He cursed the fruit, scorched them with his fiery breath, stamped on them and then spat on them to make them unfit to eat - and if you believe all that nonsense you will also understand that that is why you should never eat brambles picked on or after "Devil's Spit Day."

The rearing of geese can be a profitable enterprise on a farm. The use and manipulation of lighting programmes for all-year-round breeding brought great benefits to the poultry industry, but geese have not responded to the same extent as chicken and turkeys. Consequently, they continue to have a short breeding season with goslings hatching from spring through to late summer.

Geese are truly seasonal poultry reared in small flocks. There has been a small increase in the number of geese coming onto the market in recent years, but it's not a bird you can mass produce, and that is why goose meat is a luxury-priced food when compared with any of the other poultry meats. According to the British Poultry Council (BPC) only 250,000 geese are reared for consumption every year in the UK - compared with about 10 million turkeys reared for Christmas (about two thirds of annual production).

More families turning to a goose for the first time are often surprised by how different the meat is from other poultry - darker, more succulent and with a distinctive texture and flavour. Indeed, as in former times, the fat is part of the appeal.

It's a much softer form of fat than that in red meat, with analysis revealing a higher proportion of the more desirable mono-unsaturated fatty acids. Top chefs love goose fat, which is ideal for roasting potatoes and parsnips and can be bought in jars throughout the year.

Goose is the Christmas favourite in much of Europe, with the French arguably one of the biggest devotees, particularly of foie gras ("fatty liver"). It is thought that farming ducks and geese for their fat livers began over a thousand years ago, when it was discovered that having gorged themselves on cereals and other crops, in preparation for the autumn migration, they had large, fatty and nutritious livers.

Nowadays, around 20,000 tonnes of foie gras are produced worldwide each year. The French contribute 70 per cent of that and make up 85 per cent of global consumption - the average French person eats foie gras at least ten times every year.

I have seen ducks and geese force fed to achieve their fatty livers and while it is more revolting to watch than cruel it is a farming practice that I strongly disapprove of.