TikTok videos are fuelling the popularity of chicken feet in a Dublin butcher’s shop.

 Chicken feet is a considered a delicacy in many Asian countries but is shunned by most meat-eaters in western nations. 

Recent viral videos have changed that and more and more customers at the Village Butcher in Ranelagh are buying it. 

“TikTok seems to be really big now,” owner Sarah Kelly told Henry McKean for The Hard Shoulder.  

“People putting together recipes, people reviewing restaurants, new trends and food. 

“So, it’s very easily accessible to everybody.

“For us we have people coming in looking for offal, looking for different cuts, slow cuts, things that went out of fashion are coming back into fashion again… Now you have people branching out into things like the feet, a lot of bones, necks and even the carcasses for stock.” 

Ms Kelly says her Irish customers are increasingly “very well travelled” and feels they are used to eating adventurous foods. 

One thing they often buy chicken feet for is stock - which Ms Kelly describes as “really good” to eat. 

“The nutritional value, the taste, the flavour is all in those cuts - the carcasses, the wings, the feet, the necks,” she explained. 

“So, you would make a stock or broth and then you would take these out and you would drink the stock and the broth - so you’re getting all the goodness - without having to eat the feet.” 

Waste

Regardless of what is driving the trend, Ms Kelly is always pleased to reduce waste in her shop. 

“For us, we like to utilise every part of the animal and have no waste,” she said. 

“It’s really, really important for us and we’re trying to put to use every ingredient we can.” 

Globally, around 25% of all food is wasted and it creates between 8 and 10% of all humanity’s carbon emissions.

Main image: Chicken feet for sale at the local market the Mekong River in Sa Dec, Vietnam. Picture by: Alamy.com