August 27, 2006

Cyber chef, or, When Clivia Tried Really Hard Eating Liver

As you all know by now we Swedish food bloggers have our own Paper Chef, called Cyberkocken. I will make a special posting about it in Swedish too but have to share the recipe with you English-speaking people out there. To make a long story short, this event was hosted by Viktoria over at Kardemumma (means cardamom), a very nice food blog by the way, and the given ingredients were mushrooms, mozzarella, almonds and - tadaa - chicken liver. As Viktoria said: "I have eaten it too little to like it", and I totally agreed. You see, I eat most things and tries to keep an open mind, but intestines are hard.
Actually I have thought about chicken liver quite a few times recently. It is cheap, it is good for you... Maybe, I thought, I will give it a try. Some time. The Cyber chef gave me this opportunity - thanks Victoria! (And sorry, no picture right now. How I hate blogger sometimes.)

So, after shopping and thinking and shopping again and more thinking I made this:

200 grams of chicken liver cut in small pieces
3 large champignons and a small bag of yellow chanterelles from the freezer, cut in pieces
1 large shalott onion, finely chopped
about 100 ml roughly chopped flat-leaf parsley
1 small splash of balsamic vinegar
salt and a lot of freshly ground black pepper
4-5 slices of good bread
4-5 slices mozzarella
about 100 ml roughly chopped toasted almonds

Fry the liver, mushrooms and onion in a little butter until brown. Salt, pepper, vinegar... Let simmer for some minutes. Stir in the parsley.
Put the mix on the bread slices and put mozzarella on top.
Bake in hot oven until the cheese has melted and got a nice colour
Put on plates and scatter the almonds on top

Sounds and looks good, doesn´t it? The problem is, I really couldn´t eat it. Believe me, I tried! After frying and peppering I tried a bite and said to A "I can feel it is tasty, but I will not be able to eat this". Strange, isn´t it? I could feel that it was good and that a person who loves liver would love this - but I just couldn´t face eating any more. It is something about the taste, and something about the texture. I made just one sandwich, took the photo, tried another bite (still no luck) and threw it out. That is the poor poor truth about this dish.

But if you are into intestines - this is a hit!

4 comments:

Kinna Jonsson said...

I am the one to blame because I suggested the liver. ;-) Your recipte sounds nice though!

Rachael Narins said...

I think the trick is to saute it in butter, add lots of alcohol, then puree it with cream. Makes it into pate, and its much easier to eat!

Bravo to you for giving something new a whirl though. Liver is tricky indeed.

Anonymous said...

Clivia, I guess this means it won't appear on your list of 5 things to eat (try) before you die. I've tagged you, hope you have time.

Clivia said...

Kinna, I am so glad to be given this opportunity - even if I didn´t quite like it in the end...
Rachael, I will try that next time. Chicken liver is too good for you and too cheap to not use!
Tanna, well, I think I can come up with something more pleasant for that list! Thanks for tagging me, I will get around to it as soon as possible.