Liver paté with bacon

Christmas is around the corner and homemade pate is nice a addition to the breakfast, brunch or lunch table. It has been a while since I have made this but a sweet friend asked me on Facebook if I had a decent recipe for a pate, of course I have.

The story goes that when I lived i Pusan South Korea, the scandinavian ladies could not find decent liver pate for their open faced sandwiches. So we had to make our own and since there was an abundance of the ingredients that was not a problem.

This recipe makes about 500 grams

150 g pork liver

4 pc anchovies filets

100 g bacon, 50 g fat/lard, 1/2 ts salt

or if you do not want the bacon flavor use

100 g fat/lard, 1,5 ts salt

1 onion

1 ½ dl milk

3 tbs flour

½ ts pepper

½ ground allspice

1 egg

Cut the liver, bacon, fat and onions in to small pieces and put it in a food processor with the anchovies and blend it all up, then add the rest of the ingredients and continue blending until it becomes a smooth mass.

Pour the it in to a greased pot or 2 smaller pots and place it/them on a baking tray that can hold water, add about a liter of water in the tray and bake in the oven for about an hour on 175  ºC (347 Fahrenheit)The pate is finished when the baking thermometer shows 76 ºC.(169 Fahrenheit)

You can make a big batch of this and freeze it, just make sure that the pots you use can be placed in the freezer and oven.

Rillette de Canard

Have you ever tried duck rillettes? This french goodnes of meat cooked to shreds in its own fat.

Rillettes was usually made with pork, but today there are meny different kinds, some even with fish.

For this recipe you need.

1 duck

5-6 stalks of thyme

5-6 bayleafs

 1,5 tbs salt

1,5 tbs whole pepper corns

Cut the duck and remove the skin and fat (Cook the skin and fat in a separate pot click HERE for instructions)

Put all the ingredients in a pot and cover with water

Give it a boil and let it simmer on medium heat for about 2 hours, until the meat is tender and comes off the bones by itself

Shred the meat

and continue simmering the meat with 1 cup of the broth and 1/4 cup of the fat for about an hour.

Fill jars or little clay pots with the meat and top it with a little duck fat and let them cool

Enjoy the rillettes with bread or use it in salads if you like.

Save the fat and broth for later, you can make nice gravy and enrich soups with the broth.

The fat is nice to sautee vegetable in.