chicken liver pate

chicken liver pate
Originally uploaded by kattebelletje.

Happily reading in Nigel Slater's Appetite, which I am enjoying at the moment, I came across this pate. I really like pates once in a while, and simple ones even more. There is one in one of Marcella Hazan's cookbooks which I made a couple of times, consisting of sauteed calf's liver and butter - and browned onions, too, if I remember correctly. It is probably in her 'Marcella's Kitchen' book. Nigel Slater's chicken liver pate looked very similar, and dead easy to do. It is not the kind of pate you have to put into a slow oven au bain marie and all that stuff, it is basically frying liver and after cooling, adding butter to make it into a spread. I adapted the amount of liver, because not everyone here in the house is into liver pate, and I expected to eat this all by myself. Take 200 grams of chicken liver, clean it, soak it in milk for half an hour, drain, and chop into halves. Fry the liver pieces in a big spoonful of butter and be careful, as liver will splatter all over you while frying. Add salt and pepper and take off the heat. Whizz in a kitchen blender (or use a stick blender) with a large chunk of butter until it is a smooth paste. Then put through a sieve (that's the only chore here) and taste for salt, then put in a pretty dish and leave in the fridge to cool. When cooled, melt some butter and some goose fat (my adaptation) in a small pan and pour over the pate. Leave to set in the fridge and eat after a night in the fridge on toast , crackers, or just some nice bread. View more of the chicken liver pate process here.