Titanic Hors D’œuvres: Chicken Liver Pâté

As you know my dear friend Angela is hosting a Titanic Anniversary party on April 14; it’s the Centenary Anniversary and she is going all out for 8 of her most fortunate friends. JT and I are very happy to be included and I have embraced her enthusiasm and jumped on the band wagon, as any good friend would do (well, I’m no saint, the reasons are purely selfish, I just LOVE this kind of stuff), thank you Angela for allowing me to share in your excitement and to help with some of the food and the embellishments! I really do LOVE this stuff.

Many of my wonderful, gentle readers have been so generous with supportive comments and enthusiasm for this fun event, we thank you sincerely. My new found friend, Charlie Louie from Australia (I really do wish we were neighbours!) gave me a link to one of her very first posts on her lovely blog, Hotly Spiced that gave us a recipe for Duck Liver Pâté from a book she received as a gift from her son (she made her recipe with chicken livers, YUM). I remembered I had a couple of chicken livers in the freezer, so I thought, why not? Plus I needed a little appi for a friend coming over for drinks on Friday! We’ve had such a mild winter, and it warmed up to close to 20°C so we had to indulge and sit on the back patio for drinks after work. We still needed a sweater, but who cares, it was March 16 for crying out loud. I ain’t complaining!

The photo was taken last fall with the foliage in all its glory! Sadly the herbs have seen better days.

I don’t think Angela is including this recipe in her dinner, but I am totally into the mood, so I wanted to try it anyway (update, Angela has kindly given me the opportunity to make this appetizer as well, so I’m really pumped about it). I have to admit, it sounded a little bland when I first read it, but I wanted to keep it true so I didn’t change it up at all. The flavours were subtle yet it was very tasty. The liver really shined with the dash of rosemary. I used a square form that I was able to push the set paté out onto a plate, Charlie plated her’s in ramekins which also looked beautiful. I had to cut the recipe down because I didn’t have enough chicken livers (plus there were only three of us) but you can click here, for Charlie’s recipe. Note, as is my usual fashion, I cut down the butter and used milk instead of cream. I didn’t feel the taste suffered because of my changes.

Serves 4-6, depending on how hungry you are!

Chicken Liver Pâté on the back deck on March 16. Who would'a thunk it!

Ingredients:

• 113 g Chicken Livers
• 25 g melted butter
• 13 mL milk
• 1/4 tsp brandy (I actually cheated and added about a tablespoon)
• 1/4 tsp chopped rosemary
• crackers

Directions:

1. Heat 15 g of the butter in a saucepan, add the livers and cook gently for 3-4 minutes. The livers should be cooked on the outside but a little pink on the inside.
2. When the livers are cooked, place them into a processor and process until smooth.
3. Add the brandy and rosemary to the saucepan then heat gently, scraping up the residue of the livers.
4. Add the heated brandy and rosemary to the liver in the processor, together with milk and seasoning. Process until smooth.
5. Pack the paté into a form (mine was square) and pour the remaining melted butter over the top of the pate to seal, cover and place in the fridge to chill. This should be made in advance so that the flavours have a chance to really pop.

Thanks again, Charlie, I look forward to making this for April 14th (I’ll likely do your proportions at that time!)

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