The meat you are most likely to eat actually comes from across the border in the Limousin – the caramel-coloured Limousine cattle whose pretty look and large brown eyes hide a fairly contrary character. Still, their meat is superb – low in fat but still tender and full of flavour.
In the Deux-Sevres, your steak could be from a Parthenaise. One of the oldest breeds in France, they were once raised for milk but now are solely beef cattle. Their meat is ruby red in colour, tender, low in fat but still flavoursome. If you want to see them, there is a cattle market every Wednesday in the town of Parthenay.