Venison Liver with Onions, Bacon, and Sage

After a year of some concerted effort to eat more of it, I have come to enjoy and savor the flavor of liver. Eating liver makes me feel happy and nourished, like I am being good to my body. I love when I cook it just right and it tastes perfectly tender. This recipe is my current fave - using whatever kind of liver (venison, chicken, calf, lamb) - especially now when there is abundant fresh sage. I did try this with beef liver too - and it was still pretty good, but you know, liver-y. The venison livers I have are often from younger deer, so they resemble calf more than full grown beef. Beef livers are a bit full flavored. Whichever liver, I have finally learned to cook it well, which is to say, I have learned not to over-cook it. As Jennifer McLagan writes in Odd Bits, "Seared crisp on the outside and meltingly tender on the inside, enriched with butter and spread on toast or quickly grilled with a warm and creamy center - well prepared liver is sublime." Yes. Sublime. 

This recipe (originally for calf's liver) is from Odd Bits, a cookbook I am hoping to explore more this winter. It is a cookbook full of recipes to cook the "odd" parts of an animal: tongue, sweetbreads, brain and tripe - among MANY others. I am currently happy in the liver section, whose introduction asserts that every cuisine has a liver specialty. I have looked up some of the ones she mentions, plus a few others to return to for liver inspiration later:  

• Italian fegato all veneziana
• Jewish chopped chicken liver 
• Eastern European liver dumplings and liver in cream sauce
• Chinese stir-fried liver 
• German braunschweiger, a liver sausage
• English (and Irish) liver and bacon
• Finland's maksalaatikko, a dessert of liver and rice pudding flavored with syrup and raisins
• Persian del va jegar, chicken heart and liver (and a liver and lung too)
• Paraguay's higado 
• Portuguese peri-peri
• Ethiopian dulet, a blend of beef, tripe, and liver 

Dulet Photo

The last one is the one I am most intrigued by, at least at this moment. I have not found a recipe, but the link above likens the dulet to kitfo, which I may have mentioned once or 1000 times that I LOVE, and in fact the author of the link prefers the dulet. I did find that Dilla's on the west bank in Minneapolis serves Dulet (neither Fasika or Blue Nile do), so maybe it is worth venturing there. In the meanwhile, I will enjoy this liver and onions take on things (modified slightly from Odd Bits):

Venison Liver with Onions, Bacon, and Sage
Serves 2
2 thick slices bacon, double smoked if possible
1/4 c duck fat (I used butter)
3 onions, halved and thinly sliced
Coarse sea salt and freshly ground pepper
16 sage leaves, finely shredded
9 oz liver (or more!)
coconut flour
1+ T sherry vinegar

1. Cut the bacon into 1/4 inch strips. Heat half the fat in a frying pan over medium heat and add the bacon and onions. Season with salt and pepper and cook, stirring often, until the onions are softened and colored, then stir in the sage and keep warm in a 200 degree oven. *For best results and added fussiness, also put two dinner plates in the oven to warm.
2. Dust the liver slices lightly with coconut flour (you don't need much) and season with salt and pepper. In another frying pan, just big enough to hold the liver slices, heat the remaining fat over high heat. When the fat is hot, add the liver and cook until you see beads of blood on the top surface of the liver, 45 seconds to 1 minute, turn and cook on the other side for about 30 seconds, or until you again see beads of blood form. Transfer the liver to (warm) plates.
3. Add vinegar to the pan, stir to deglaze, scraping up the browned bits, and then add the pan juices to the onion mixture. Top the liver with onion mixture (or as in my photo, top onions with liver) and serve.

Rumaki

I made some super delicious rumaki last weekend. Yum. This is an amazing appetizer/pre-dinner - or even straight up dinner if you want to go for that much bacon and liver! Plus, it is very 1950's should you be going to some kind of theme party...throw in some deviled eggs and you are all set.

I have had rumaki without marinading the liver and I think it tastes just fine. I don't know if the marinade made it extra good this time, but it definitely tasted better. This is also the first time I used water chestnuts, so do what you will. I keep trying to think up something a bit more local and tasty in place of the water chestnuts...radish slices are my best thought so far. I'll let you know how that goes. I also wanted a little more ginger. Next time I will put a little fresh ginger in each rumaki (in addition to the marinade).

Rumaki
5 pieces bacon, halved cross-wise
10 water chestnuts
just under 1/2 lb chicken livers, cut in half (you want about 10 pieces total)
2 T coconut aminos
1 tsp freshly grated ginger

1. Marinate livers in coconut aminos and ginger for 30 minutes-2 hours.
2. Pre-cook bacon in a 400 degree oven. Lay bacon slices in a cookie sheet or cake pan with an edge. Cook for about 10 minutes, until cooked but not crisp. Pour bacon fat off of pan and let bacon sit until cool enough to touch.
3. Lay the chicken liver and a water chestnut in the center of a bacon slice. Add a little fresh ginger if you want, and wrap bacon around filling and secure with a toothpick before placing back on bacon pan. Continue with remaining ingredients until you have 10 bacon wrapped livers.
4. Bake in oven until bacon is crisp and golden, about 7-9 minutes. Serve!

Liver! (of a lamb in this case)

Well, another 4-8 inches of snow tonight and I think that puts us very solidly in the "most snow in April ever" category. I was super happy to come from work tonight to meatloaf in the crockpot (all ready to eat!) and some mashed cauliflower (had to make that, but it was worth it for the total comfort food extravaganza). The forecast says 60 degrees on Friday, so, I venture to say this is the last of the snow.

I got taken out to fancy dinner last night, and after laboring and laboring over the decision about where, I finally opted for Sea Change, the sustainable seafood restaurant in the Guthrie. I wanted oysters and some culinary fancy schmantz, and definitely got that. Now I am in love with raw oysters and am on a mission to learn how to shuck them myself. They have lots of omega 3s, and more zinc than any other food (zinc helps protect against UV radiation among lots of other great things). Oysters also seem to be one of the only kinds of seafood that are best to get farmed as opposed to wild; though Seafood Watch currently has both farm and wild rated as "Best Choice." So, I will be perusing some oyster shucking youtube videos in the coming weeks...hopefully to learn and master some kind of technique!

In the meantime, I am trying to eat liver every week or so to get all the amazing nutrients. Last week I saw that the Seward carries Lamb livers, and decided to give them a try. I thought they were good, though I over cooked mine a little. They actually don't need much time - so it might be worthwhile to actually set a timer so that they stay tender.

Lamb (or beef or venison) Liver
1/2 pound liver
2 T coconut flour
3 T coconut oil/lard/bacon fat
onions
bacon

You want your liver about 1/2" - 3/4" thick, so depending on how it comes to you, you may need to slice the liver lengthwise down the center so it isn't too thick. Mine was on the thicker side, but in 4 easy slices, so I just kept them that way.

I like to eat the liver with some onions and bacon, so prepare those however you want: I prefer cooking bacon in the oven, and caramelizing onion slices, but you could also chop up the bacon and cook it and the onions all together.

Liver is not so photogenic as it is good for you. Alas.

For the liver: heat the fat in a cast iron skillet on medium heat. While it is heating, coat your liver pieces in coconut flour. This is easiest done by shaking the liver in a baggie with the flour to get everything nicely coated. When the oil in the pan is hot, lay liver pieces flat (or flat-ish). Cook for about 90 seconds - 2 minutes a side, and sprinkle with salt and pepper while on the 2nd side. *This is worth setting a timer for! It will taste way better when not over-cooked, I promise.

Serve liver with onions and bacon, or just one or the other. Depending on how much liver you can eat, this will serve one or two!

Bacon wrapped Scallops with Swiss Chard

All the snow seems to have inspired a sense of indulgence for me this weekend (though really, I am always on the lookout for an opportunity for indulgence). In this case, it was about some more expensive food items (scallops, pork butt, and bacon), and also some nice outings and overall sense of leisure and expansive snowy weekend time.

I did some reading, snow-shoeing (thanks to some borrowed snow shoes that I am behind in returning), and went to a really lovely, very snowy film, Happy People by Werner Herzog. The film is a documentary about a small town in Siberia that is accessible only by helicopter or boat (only when the water is not iced over). The town's people are fairly cut off from modern invention - they use snow machines and chain saws, but most everything else they make. The craftsmanship is really amazing, and the images throughout the whole film are stunning (you see many of them in the preview linked above.) It is showing at the newly refurbished Uptown Theatre - which now has very spacious, leather seating and even a bar and sofas on the 2nd floor!?

The weekend started out Friday evening with a dinner of Bacon wrapped Scallops and some Swiss Chard. I love scallops, and the slightly tart greens were a nice complement to the sweetness of the scallops and bacon. After some trial and error, My Charming Companion and I determined that 5 large scallops each is a preferred amount. Ten scallops came out to about 8/10 of a pound, so you can figure accordingly how many scallops you might prefer (remember there is a lot of bacon involved too!)

See upper right scallops for how NOT to wrap bacon!

Scallops
10 large wild scallops
10 slices of bacon (you will trim off part of each slice, which makes leftovers for breakfast!)
fresh lemon
10 toothpicks

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Wrap each scallop in the bacon, making sure to overlap the bacon just enough to secure with a toothpick. Trim off excess bacon (optional) and save for tomorrow's breakfast. Place scallops in a cake pan and bake for 20-25 minutes, until bacon is crispy. While scallops are cooking, make chard recipe below.

Swiss Chard
1 large bunch swiss chard
1/2 onion, sliced thin
2 T ghee, butter, coconut oil, or bacon fat
splash vinegar (I used champagne vinegar, but apple cider would be good too)
salt to taste

Heat fat in a large skillet. Add onions and saute for a few minutes. Trim chard leaves chard from the ribs, and chop the ribs in small pieces. Add chopped chard ribs to onion and saute for another 5+ minutes, stirring occasionally until onions are translucent. Add chopped chard greens and saute for another 10 minutes. Season with a splash of vinegar and salt to taste.

Serve scallops over or alongside chard.

AND THEN....don't abandon the really delicious bacon fat and scallop juice from the pan! It is delicious the next morning with scrambled eggs. They taste scallop-y and soft and amazing and I could not wait to make breakfast.

Just stick the juice filled pan in the fridge overnight. In the morning, stick the pan in the oven at 350 degrees for a few minutes to heat up. Stir up some eggs with a bit of salt, and then pour them into the heated cake pan. Bake in the oven for 10 minutes or so, stirring every few minutes. I chopped a bunch of parsley to add in to the eggs, and made a saute of onions and peppers with the leftover bacon ends to go with. Yum!

Kimchi Jjigae take 2

I have made Kimchi Jjigae 3 or 4 times since I posted the original recipe in November. I am almost out of my big kimchi batch from last summer, so it appears that I will never get to year old kimchi (which would be best in this recipe) - at least not until next year when I will have to make a really big batch. Since my original post, I have switched over from using nori seaweed as a garnish and instead just put in a bunch of wakame. The wakame is delicious! I want to try making a salad out of it sometime - maybe when there are more fresh veggies around. It is a pretty mild seaweed with a silky texture. I bought mine from United Noodle in a 5 oz bag that I think will last a year because one handful = a lot of seaweed once you hydrate it in water.

It tastes amazing in the kimchi jjigae - it sort of mellows the sour from the kimchi. I love to slurp this soup up on the weekend - I don't know if it is all the bacon, or what, but it's sort of delectable and weekend-ish. I have modified this recipe a bit from the original to include the wakame, and I also added in some broth to make a slightly thinner soup. I recently discovered that the Wedge carries Red Boat fish sauce, which is GF and is made only from fermented anchovies with no other added stuff. It is REALLY good, and I put that in the soup too.

Kimchi Jjiage with wakame (serves 6)
Large handful dried wakame
2 tablespoons toasted sesame oil
1 pound bacon, cut into 1/4" pieces
Freshly ground black pepper
Medium yellow onion, coarsely chopped
3-4 cups coarsely chopped kimchi with its liquid (use the most pungent, sour kimchi you have)
1 T Red Boat fish sauce
5 scallions, thinly sliced (opt)
2 c. chicken broth (opt)

Put large handful of wakame in a bowl and cover with water to soak.

Heat the sesame oil in a large soup pot over medium heat. Add the pork belly/bacon, season with pepper, and cook, stirring now and then, until rendered, browned, and crispy, about 10 minutes.

Add the onion and kimchi and stir to combine. Add enough water to nearly cover the pork mixture (5 or 6 cups), cover, and bring to a boil. Immediately reduce the heat and simmer until the onion and kimchi are softened and the soup is quite thick, about 20 minutes.

Stir in the fish sauce, broth and scallions. Drain the wakame, chop it up and add to the soup. Cover the pot and simmer for 10 minutes to combine the flavors. Serve steaming hot.

Creamed Spinach with Bacon (and fried fish)

I love to not drive whenever possible, and the long holiday weekend was a perfect time to just walk places and be very slow paced. One such walkable visit included my friends' new bookstore, Moon Palace Books (I did some shelving - check out the alphabetized fantasy section!) behind Peace Coffee on Minnehaha. The creamed spinach recipe I made is from the Smitten Kitchen blog - and she actually just published a cookbook. They have it at Moon Palace Books if you want to take a peak - it looks really good.

Another local visit for the weekend was Everett's grocery store (38th and Cedar) for some fish. Everett's sells frozen Pike filets (and walleye) - as well as lots of other sort of Scandinavian fish varieties that are just not all that common elsewhere. The Pike is pretty cheap at $6 a pound, and the walleye is about twice that. Both are caught in Canada.

So, those two adventures lead us to today's post of fried Pike and Creamed Spinach! I have never had creamed spinach before, and I am not sure what quite possessed me to suddenly want some, except that I had a package of frozen spinach in the freezer and the cold weather usually makes me want more cream whenever possible. My Charming Companion made the Pike exactly as if the pike were fresh and we were camping as outlined here. Meanwhile, I was sauteing onions in butter and stirring in creamy substances to make this tasty side dish. I modified the Smitten Kitchen recipe below:

Creamed Spinach (serves 2 large portions or 4 very small ones!)
1 10 oz package frozen spinach
1/4 + c heavy cream
1/4 c coconut cream (the thick part of the coconut milk when it is separated - regular coconut milk would work too)
1/2 small onion, finely chopped
1 1/2 T butter
1 t coconut flour
Pinch of freshly grated nutmeg
Salt and Pepper

1. Cook your spinach as instructed: mine was to add the spinach to a cup of boiling water and simmer, covered, for 8 minutes. Drain the cooked spinach when finished, pressing it through a sieve to get as much liquid out as you can.

My very poor quality photo of lunch!

2. In a medium saucepan, melt butter, then add onion and saute on med-low heat until translucent (about 5 minutes). Whisk in the coconut flour, stirring constantly to thicken the butter/onion mix just a bit. Add cream and coconut milk/cream slowly, whisking while you go. Add spinach, nutmeg, and salt and pepper. Stir while the mixture thickens and cooks down a bit - just a few minutes. Serve right away, or reheat when ready. It's very tasty topped with some chopped bacon!

*For a VEGAN version of this dish, just use all coconut milk, omit the coconut flour, and instead of nutmeg, use 1/2 t ginger, and  a dash of cumin. It tastes delicious.

Roasted Broccoli & Bacon

So, continuing on with my roasted veggie theme, this one adds in some bacon for extra deliciousness. It would still be tasty without though. I like how the edges turn a little brown, and the roasting brings out so much flavor! This "recipe" comes from "The Clothes Makes the Girl" blog.

Just cut 2 heads of broccoli up in large florets - I also use the stalks since they are so hearty (just peel the tough outer layer). Toss the broccoli with some coconut oil, and then layer flat in a pan. Cut up 4 slices of bacon, and toss that in the pan too. Bake at 400 degrees for 30 minutes or so, flipping or stirring a couple of times. Sprinkle a little smoky salt and pepper on top and serve!

Frisee Salad with Poached Eggs and Bacon (a la Barbette)

Well, it might seem like I only eat salad and eggs lately. And bacon too. Kinda true, but they are all just so dang good!

I had a salad at Barbette sometime ago, and it was basically this salad, although they called the bacon "lardon" - apparently due to its thicker cut. It made for a very tasty brunch meal, so when I happened across a recipe for Frisee Salad with Poached Eggs and Bacon in Saveur a few weeks ago, I thought I'd give it a whirl. It seems like it would make a delicious brunch pre- any of the queer activities happening this weekend for pride. It's green and light, but also meaty and filling. It just feels so gay. Maybe because it is French?

Rather than use "frisee greens" (I really don't know what those are - seems like frizzy micro lettuce from the picture!), I used some of the baby greens from the garden that I was thinning out as the beets and arugula get bigger. Did you know it is a good idea to thin your beets with a scissors? That way you don't destroy any of the fragile roots when you pull up the neighbors that are all squished in there too closely. Also, I learned that a good rule is to thin twice. First to get all the mini plants that are growing right on top of one another (you know, the ones that are basically growing out of the same spot), and then second, when the plants are a little bigger. The second time you want to thin the smaller ones away (think Darwin here...the biggest most luscious plants survive), but make sure that the plants that are left are still sort of touching one another. It turns out plants are happiest when they are with others like them - which I could say is just like all of us.

Anyway, I especially like that the dressing includes some of the bacon fat (it turns out quite tasty), and I love poached eggs. So. Gay. So. Delish. Happy Pride!

Cobb Salad

oh WFDM! I think many of us are busy with the season: putting in raised beds, planting, trying to keep up with spring, finishing school, looking for jobs, etc. Yay for spring changes and growing and green things!

I was craving cobb salad all last week. I actually am not even sure I have ever even HAD cobb salad before, but the idea of it was sounding really good. So I went to Smitten Kitchen, and sure enough she had a "Classic Cobb Salad" recipe that looked to be just what I was imagining. I followed her recipe pretty much exactly, and it is delicious.


A few notes:
1. Prep these items first: Cook the chicken (35 min), boil the eggs, and cook the bacon - I recommend in that order! I used the same water I boiled the eggs in to quickly dunk the tomatoes so I could remove the skin. Everything will need to cool a bit while you make the dressing and prep the lettuces/avocado/cheese.
2. For the chicken: I got some bone/skinless chicken thighs (darker thigh meat is much juicier than breasts), rubbed them in olive oil, salt, and pepper, and baked them at 375 for 35 minutes.
3. I have not had a chance to get to the farmer's market yet, but the co-op has local tomatoes and lettuces in abundance. According to the Seward produce department sign, watercress is out of season though. I found some WI "Upland Cress" that seems similar and is spicy and nice, and arugula would be good too.

Pork Bolognese

Um, here comes recipe #2 from Martha. I dunno. There the magazine was, there I was with all the ingredients in it, and suddenly meaty pasta was sounding SO good. And I have to admit, I have never used a recipe when making tomato-based pasta dishes before. I usually just throw things in with tomatoes and call it good.

But this. This is another story. I mean, there is wine, chicken broth, milk, bacon, AND meat. I had just made my own broth after cooking a chicken in the crockpot, and I happened to have left over wine, and meat and bacon in the freezer. I've also been working a lot lately and packing both lunch and dinner, which necessitates creative food composition and larger quantities. This is comfort food for meat eaters, it made the kitchen smell amazing, and the leftovers were delicious.


Serves 8
3 slices bacon, finely chopped
1 small onion, finely chopped
1 medium carrot, finely chopped
1 celery stalk, finely chopped
2 pounds ground pork (or other meat)
1/4 c. tomato paste
1 c. dry white wine
1 1/4 c. whole milk
1 can (28 oz) tomato sauce
2 c. chicken broth
1 bay leaf
5 sprigs fresh thyme
coarse salt and fresh pepper
cooked penne, for serving
grated parmesan, for serving

1. In large dutch oven or heavy pot, cook bacon over medium until fat is released (5 min). Add onion, carrot, and celery; cook until soft (6 min). Raise heat to medium-high; add pork and cook, breaking up meat with a wooden spoon, until browned (7 min). Add tomato paste; cook until pork is coated (4 min).
2. Add wine; cook until reduced by 3/4. Add 1 c. milk; cook until reduced by 1/2. Add tomato sauce, broth, bay leaf, thyme, 2 1/2 t. salt, and 1/2 t. pepper. Simmer, stirring occasionally, for 1 hour. Stir in 1/4 c. milk. Serve sauce over pasta, topped with cheese.

*My changes: I used some homemade sausage (part venison, part bacon), had kind of bad wine that I am not sure if it was dry or not, and did not have fresh thyme. It was still good. So was the quinoa pasta I used, btw.

Homemade Sausage

*To the veggies/vegan leaning folks on WFDM - I hope you aren't sicked out by some meat processing photos.
I learned a bunch of new things about sausage: you can use the meat without casing and eat it like a breakfast patty, in sauce or on pizza, OR you can put the filling in the casing, giving you brats or italian sausage or whatever. The casings for these came from Kramarczuk's in Northeast. If you want to make sausage but not worry about meat grinders or casings, you can make these sausages with a food processor. Make extra and freeze patties until you want to eat them.

The first recipe is from Savoring the Seasons (Lucia's cookbook), and is called "Uncle Byron's Game Sausage." It is sweeter, with fresh parsley and onions, and not as spicy as the second one, which we'll just call "Sage Sausage" due to the predominant sage flavor (along with a random selection of spices from the spice drawer). I used a venison/bacon combo in these because My Charming Companion has an abundant supply of venison, but certainly pork is more traditional.

Uncle Byron's Game Sausage *makes 4 pounds
3 lbs venison/game meat
1 lb bacon
2 c. peeled, finely chopped onions
1 red bell pepper, seeded, deveined, finely chopped
1 c. finely chopped parsley
2 T. finely chopped garlic
2 T. seeded, finely chopped fresh hot chili peppers
2 t. crushed, dried hot pepper
2 t. dried thyme
1/4 c. fennel seed
1/2 t. allspice
1 T. salt
Coarsely grind meat, bacon, and onion in a food processor or meat grinder. Turn into a bowl and mix together remaining ingredients, using your hands if needed, until the seasonings/flavors are evenly distributed. To cook: shape into patties and saute or grill until middle is not pink or crumble a large portion into a skillet and cook.

Sage Sausage
6 lbs venison
2 lbs bacon
3 T. sage
2 T. salt
2 t. pepper
1/4 c. fennel seed
3 heads garlic, finely chopped
2 T. paprika
1 t. cayenne
1 t. red pepper flakes
1/2 t. coriander
Prepare same as above!