Boys and Girls, hang on to your hats because I am taking you on a crazy and offal adventure. I am usually against New Year’s resolutions, I think for most of us it is a setup for disappointment. But I made a very unusual resolution this year: trying to acquire a taste for liver! So for the next 10 weeks I will cook, consume and post my experience about trying to appreciate my food nemesis. I will shortly explain why I ended up on this path in the first place. But first I am officially baptizing this series The Liver Experiment and the first dish I present to you is a Chicken Liver Pâté and Absinthe.
I can hear you all now: Evelyne, how the heck did you get yourself into this predicament? Well it all started with a book I started reading called The Man Who Ate Everything by Jeffrey Steingarten, Vogue magazine’s food critic and writer. The book consists of a series of humors essays about food. The first chapter describes how he sat down and made a list of all the food he hated when he got the job at Vogue. This prompted a little research on how to conquer foods we hate.
So the theory is a child will probably eventually like a food he/she hates after serving it 8 to 10 times. This could explain why so many children are fussy as the parents give up after 2 or 3 tries. Hmm! Anyways I was certainly forced to eat liver more than 10 times in my youth. My mom made it not because she loved it necessarily but because it was good for us. Only problem is her preparation was the cook it to death in the pan resulting in a great substitute for the sole of a shoe. This is where my hatred for liver started and even though I have tasted ‘well cooked’ liver since I just don’t have a taste for it.
Steingarten did this experiment with his list and he got over hi dislike of most of the food he hated. I was to tempted to try this with liver. The point of this experiment is not to like liver, I just want to test out this theory. There will be no winners or losers, no passing grade. Just playing food psychology.
I am not alone in this experiment. I have mentioned this to several friends and one of them, Sandra, decided to join me for these 10 weeks with her food nemesis: Jello or gelatin. To each his own enemy I guess hihi. At the end we will have a dinner where I will prepare a gelatin dessert and she will prepare liver for me. She likes liver (crazy girl!)
This actually looks appetizing on this photo
Week 1 was last week, I just did not get around to posting yet so expect Week 2 this week. I decided to go as safe as possible my first time around and chose to prepare liver pâté. I found a very simple pâté recipe here which used Pineau. I did not have any so I substituted with what I had at home and made a Chicken Liver Pâté with Absinthe. It’s not like you taste the alcohol that much anyways.
The preparation went well and I was not grossed out by the process. Turns out I had not realized I had hearts attached as well to my liver so in they went. I’ll know next time lol. I was excited to pour off some butter and a bay leaf and let it set overnight in the fridge. At this point I could say it esthetically looked good.
I was not expecting any miracles where I would suddenly fall in love with the taste. I was right it was tolerable, not excellent for me. It was not as bad the 2nd day too. I brought my pâté to work and everyone who dared to try really enjoyed it. So at least I can say it is a good liver pâté recipe as it got lots of thumbs of from liver fans.
Chicken Liver Pate and Absinthe
Ingredients
- 500 g chicken livers
- 100 g butter
- 100 g unsmoked lardons or chopped streaky bacon
- 1 garlic clove crushed or finely chopped
- 1 tbsp fresh thyme leaves or 1 tsp dried
- 5 tbsp Absinthe
- herb sprigs to garnish rosemary, thyme or bay
Instructions
- Rinse the chicken livers and cut away any dark patches and small stringy threads. Pat dry with kitchen paper. Heat 25g of the butter in a frying pan until foaming, then add the lardons or bacon and fry until crisp. Add the garlic, chicken livers and thyme and fry briskly for about 5 mins, until they are evenly browned. They should be nicely browned on the outside, but pink inside and should feel squashy when pressed.
- Add the Absinthe, salt and pepper, then bubble for a few minutes. Remove from the heat. Blitz the mixture in a food processor until smooth, then spoon into a jar or dish. Smooth the top.
- Melt the remaining butter, put a herb sprig or bay leaf on top of the pâté and pour over the butter, leaving the sediment behind. Leave to cool, then chill until set.4 Serve spooned from the dish with bread.
I have survived week 1 and I have already chosen my recipe for week 2. I have not discussed facts and such about liver yet but we have 9 more posts to do that. It will be instructional as well this series. So what food is your nemesis? What do you think of trying such an experiment?
The liver pate looks great! I’m sure it taste great too!
I should be there with you for the liver experiment! As I mentioned in your recent post, I’m not much of a liver fan, but my husband is crazy about it (and I think he tends to eat too much when he gets to eat liver pate). It’s fun reading your experiment!
Yum yum yum! Wow.
Well, I certainly do admire you for your determination to like liver. It’s going to be interesting to watch you cook your way through this journey. Pate is the only way that I can eat liver, in fact, I love pate! Interesting twist to use Absinthe. I must try this!
I love liver pate, but never made at my own…I would love to dig into it…yum!
I like the idea of the anise touch from the Absinthe.
Hope you are having a fabulous week Evelyne 😀
I had absinthe once. It was awful. Maybe just because I hate black licorice with a passion.
You are such an inspiration Evelyne! Growing up I didn’t care for the taste of liver, but the smell of it cooking with onions always drew me in for a taste. I love pate and have to admit that chicken livers are really good. I can’t wait to see your whole series and be inspired — making pate is on my list to try. Oh, by the way your pate (hearts and all) looks really good!
G’day Evelyne!
BRILLIANT post today, true!
I LOVE Jeffrey Steingarten and wish he was still on tv critiquing food too!
Cheers! Joanne
LOL…of all my blogger friends, you are the only one I can think of who’d come up with a liver challenge! Can’t wait to see if you’re finally a convert at the end 🙂 I think pate is the only way I really like liver.
Not really my kind of food because of high cholesterol, not of the taste.
I like cow liver but I’m not a fan of chicken liver. Than being said, I’ve never tasted it cooked like this. Something to try one day in the future.
I think there is some truth in theory of trying things 8-10 times before we like them. When I first started visiting France I couldn’t look at foie gras, but my father in law kept insisting I take a bite each time and 3-4 years later I’ve started liking and appreciating it. I do believe that preparation and food pairing is crucial when tasting such things 🙂
Looks gorgeous to me, I’d be dying to try this =)
I’m okay with liver. Neither love it nor hate it. But I love your spirit and your theory. And the pate certainly looks delicious!
Although I am not a big fan of liver this one looks particularly tasty!
What an interesting theory! And I love that you’re putting it to the test too Eve! 😀
Oh and my food nemesis for years was UNI. I just couldn’t eat it. I kept trying it for years and years and each time I hated it … UNTIL last year when I had it at Park – that was it – I understood what it was supposed to taste like when it was extremely fresh and really liked it. It only took 20 years 🙂
I loooove liver. All kinds. Since I know you’re doing this you’ll have to come over for some foie de veau 🙂 The recipe looks great and I can’t wait to see what you’ll come up with 🙂
I’m ok with liver! The best liver I ever had was at the dearly departed ABC Caribbean, it was cut in a huge slab (must have been beef) and breaded and lightly fried.
I look forward to further installments in this series.
I love chicken liver,Evelyne! This recipes sounds very good!would love to try this one!
I, for one, love chicken liver, hearts and giblets. I add the liver to my csirke paprikas to make it more hearty and individualist. 🙂 If I were more ambitious about cooking I’d also use these in a homemade soup. Enjoy your liver, Ev!