OTTAWA, Ontario – The Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) today granted a petition from a consortium of restaurants in Montreal, Les Grenouilles Folles, that allows the restaurants to use bitumen as an ingredient in certain dishes. It does not apply to sane Canada; that is, the rest of the country. The agency did specify, however, that any bitumen used has to be food-grade. It has to be highly refined with all sand and heavy metals removed. Commenting off the record, the Chief Food Safety Officer said, “It won’t kill those crazy-ass people, but I can’t imagine eating something with the equivalent of road tar in it. Yuck! Oh well, these are the hosers who eat snips, snails and puppy dog tails.”
Said Excavatrice LeTourneau, one of the chefs at the Michelin-starred Voler Lâche Bistro in Montreal, “I was having a terrible problem with my soufflé falling, but after adding a few grams of bitumen, zut alors, it became rock steady.”
At the Gâteau Qui S’Effrite Bakery, owner Fou Complet said he has experimented with replacing the icing on his petit fours with bitumen and exclaimed, “Magnifique!”
Pierre Francais-Allemagne, CEO of Moospeace Beer, announced that a bitumen-flavored beer would soon be on sale, but only in Quèbec. He said, “It is far too flavorful to waste on the rest of Canada. Only we French can appreciate it!”
Suncor Energy, based in Calgary, Alberta, set up a new subsidiary, Funcor Foods, to supply the food-grade bitumen.
Joe Bleau, Suncor Vice-President of New Ventures, said,
“We thought this was some kind of a joke, to be honest. However, we checked it out thoroughly and decided to get in one the action. We found that we could charge a fortune for food-grade bitumen, so the business model works. We’re calling it Bitchin’ Bitchumin®. We’re not real sure how large the market will become, but believe me we’ve got plenty of raw material. If necessary, we’ll destroy any competitors foolish enough to try to horn in.”
Meanwhile, in Ft. McMurray everybody from the mayor on down to stray dogs were laughing their asses off.
