When Fancy Feast debuted in the early 1980s, one of its selling points was its “moist and delicious” gourmet cat foods in flavors that could win over even the most discerning feline. One of the brand’s earliest commercials featured a white Persian cat who politely ate an entire can of its Beef and Liver Feast, while telling its owner “We are worth it.”
As Food & Wine reports, over 40 years later, the Purina-owned brand is still trying to impress cats with its culinary offerings — and it wants to give their owners a taste of what they’ve been putting in their pets’ bowls.
Fancy Feast will be celebrating International Cat Day with a two-day Fête du Feline celebration in New York City’s Madison Square Park. On Monday, August 7, it will host the Fête du Feline Grand Tasting, an intimate event featuring “a variety of sips and bites” created for humans, but showcasing the flavors of Fancy Feast. The exclusive menu was designed by Fancy Feast’s in-house chef Amanda Hassner and Andrew Rea, the iconic YouTube foodie behind “Binging with Babish,” “Basics with Babish,” and the rest of the Babish Culinary Universe.
“In creating the menu for Fête du Feline, I wanted to play with all the things that make Fancy Feast so appealing to cats and bring those to life for cat lovers,” Hassner said in a statement. “Serving food, whether to other people or our pets, is such an act of love, and I want humans to get a taste of the delight cats experience when eating.”
The meal will include savory basil lemonade served “Fancy Feast-style” (which was not explained, but may or may not mean “in a metal can”) and a braised beef panzanella. Rea also put his own spin on a Fancy Feast Gems standard, paté with gravy. “Pâté is such a classic presentation in both fine dining and cat food,” he said. “I recreate famous dishes every day, but taking on my cat Bucky’s favorite food was a fun, new challenge for me.”
This isn’t the first time Fancy Feast has served feline-inspired fare to their human customers. Last summer, they launched a two night-only pop-up restaurant, Gatto Blanco, in Manhattan. The ultra-temporary trattoria based its menu on Fancy Feast’s Medleys line, and presented a multi-course meal that included baked sea bass, an Osso Bucco-inspired salmon, and Tuscan-style spare ribs.
Fancy Feast is giving away a limited number of free tickets for its Fête du Feline Grand Tasting, which will be held between 5:00 p.m. and 6:30 p.m. on Monday, August 7. Registration for the event will begin at 12:00 p.m. EST on Monday, July 31, and prospective attendees will be allowed to register for themselves and one guest. The other International Cat Day-themed experiences — including hand-drawn pet portraits and a meet-and-greet with the Fancy Feast cat — will be open to the public on Tuesday, August 8 from 11 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Oh, and cats on leashes or in carriers are also allowed to accompany their humans to the event.
If you’re undecided about going, just remember what that Liver Feast-eating cat said: You’re worth it.
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Photo Credit: Impact Photography / Shutterstock.com