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At their foie gras farm outside Quebec City, Marie-Josée Garneau and her family are preparing to set up the picnic tables where, all spring and summer, visitors will tuck in to a roadside lunch that includes blocks of fatty liver spread on toasted crackers.

As diners at Le Canard Goulu - The Greedy Duck - nibble their foie gras, a few ducks from the farm will quack around the picnic tables. In the nearby barn, Ms. Garneau has classical music piped in for the ducks, some of whom roam freely.

"The ducks must be relaxed," Ms. Garneau says. "Otherwise, the product would not taste so special."

In much of North America, animal rights activists would like to see foie gras go the way of smoking - banned from restaurants and scorned as a vice - because the ducks are force-fed for the last two weeks of their lives to engorge their livers.

Celebrity chefs such as Wolfgang Puck and Charlie Trotter have dumped foie gras from their menus. It is prohibited in Chicago and will be outlawed in California in 2012, and proposed bans are being debated in New York, Connecticut and other states.

But in Quebec, the delicacy is more popular than ever. The province is home to an industry that produces about 8,500 duck livers a week, up from a couple of hundred just a decade ago, when only a few traditional French restaurants served the delicacy. Now, foie gras is a standard menu item at upscale restaurants all over the province.

Customers at L'Eau à la Bouche in the Laurentians balk if foie gras isn't on the menu every night, says chef Anne Desjardins. "People expect it," says Ms. Desjardins, a widely respected authority on Quebec haute cuisine.

To satisfy diners, Ms. Desjardins usually has at least two options on her table d'hôte, and varies preparation according to the season. Currently, she's serving foie gras medallions with caramelized onions or pan-seared over baby turnips.

Chefs who find new and innovative ways to serve foie gras can achieve overnight star status. Montreal's Au Pied de Cochon won international acclaim in 2004 by serving foie gras on poutine. The dish, which sells an average of 30 plates a night, was viewed as taking the traditional fast-food plate of fries, cheese curds and gravy to a new level.

The restaurant is now among the most popular in the city and chef Martin Picard among the hottest chefs. Mr. Picard inserts foie gras almost anywhere: stuffed in lobster, layered on pig's leg, rolled up in a maki or seared on buckwheat pancakes. He has even added foie gras to his pea (or habitant) soup, an old Quebecois favourite.

Le Club Chasse et Pêche, in Old Montreal, also put itself on the map with a novel foie gras dish: risotto with pieces of braised suckling pig and shaved foie gras.

Some chefs prefer to stay true to more traditional foie gras preparations. Joel Chapoulie, chef at Montreal's Restaurant L'Express, a traditional bistro, serves the liver as a cold terrine, its purest form - just deveined, cooked and lightly spiced. At the Rib 'N Reef steakhouse in the city's west end, the liver is seared and served over warm berries or caramelized onions, and sometimes even on filet mignon.

Quebeckers' zest to serve foie gras at home has fuelled supermarket sales of the delicacy. Stores have expanded their offerings to include such items as jars of foie gras terrine and foie gras tourchon, which is marinated in port wine or sauternes and cooked in duck broth.

"People want to have friends over and they serve foie gras," says Elisé François, owner of foie gras farm Aux Champs d'Elisé in Marieville, a half-hour outside Montreal.

To meet growing demand, Mr. François, a former dairy farmer, built a new slaughterhouse with a neighbouring producer, Elevages Périgord, that will open at the end of the month. It will enable the two farms to boost output by up to 10 per cent. The two neighbours, along with a third producer in the same region, Palmex Inc., account for the bulk of Quebec's foie gras production.

Foie gras producers say opposition to their product comes from urbanites who know nothing about ducks or their feeding habits. They say gavage - force-feeding - mimics the ducks' natural instinct to gorge themselves before winter. They shrug off the controversy, saying that whatever business may be lost in the United States, which still accounts for about 30 per cent of sales, will be recouped within the province.

Other parts of the force-fed ducks are also popular in Quebec, including gizzards and organ meats. Especially well liked are the breast (called magret) and legs, usually cooked confit, covered in salt and slow cooked in duck fat, then vacuum packed and sold ready to serve at home.

Customers even buy raw livers to slice and cook poê lé - pan-seared for a few minutes and usually served with apple sauce or some other sweet accompaniment.

Despite the controversy, government officials continue to promote foie gras in the United States. Earlier this month, Quebec's delegate general to New York hosted a lunch for three of the city's top chefs, Daniel Boulud, Gray Kunz and Paul Liebrandt, who all serve foie gras at their restaurants.

At the lunch, Quebec foie gras was served along with Quebec grain-fed veal, Brome Lake Duck, a cheesecake made from Châteauguay goat cheese, and apple icewine.

At trade fairs, festivals and tastings attended by restaurant and food distributors, Quebec officials say they get more inquiries about foie gras than about any other Quebec product.

Even though the popularity of Quebec foie gras with some U.S. foodies helps Quebec delegate general Michel Robitaille promote other products from the province, he still has concerns about linking Quebec foods so closely with the controversial delicacy.

"We do have to be sensitive," he says.

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Variations on a theme

Terrine de foie gras : The most traditional preparation, the terrine is the pure liver, deveined, cooked, usually marinated in port wine and served cold, to be spread over toast, crackers or brioche.

Good restaurants prepare their own terrine and it can be purchased in glass jars in supermarkets and charcuteries.

Foie gras poêlé: Briefly seared in a very hot pan, the traditional version is served with warmed fruits or applesauce, and accompanied with a sauternes or a white port wine.

This is also the version that has captured the imagination of top chefs, finding its way on to poutine, hamburgers and filet mignon.

Foie gras torchon: The entire foie gras lobe is marinated in port wine, armagnac or sauternes and steamed in a cheesecloth.

Mousse or pâté of foie gras: This usually means foie gras mixed with other products such as cream, eggs, spices or other types of liver.

Magret: The breast that comes from a duck that produced foie gras. The magret is a red meat that is usually cooked whole. It is first seared in a pan and finished up in the oven.

The magret can also be hot smoked, or dry cured and cold smoked to make an excellent duck prosciutto.

Legs: The legs are usually served confit, covered with coarse salt and spices for about 24 hours and then slowly cooked in duck fat for a few hours.