Home cook here. Excited to see an active usenet NG for cooking. I will be sharing my recipes.
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Nono's chopped chicken liver
categories: Jewish, Chinese, poultry, main, mine, nine
yield: 2 lb
1/2 lb chicken skin for schmaltz
1 lg onion
2 garlic cloves
1 1/2 lb chicken livers
2 Tb sherry or madeira (opt)
salt
pepper
2 hard-boiled eggs
2 Tb chopped parsley (opt)
Take an ovenproof stoveproof dish and put the chicken
skin in over medium heat. This will render out enough
fat to prevent the gribbenes from sticking later on.
Alternatively you could use a splash of oil. I have
discovered over the years that Pam doesn't work well
for this.
Peel, top, and tail the onion and peel the garlic.
Mince the onion flesh fine and set aside.
Put the onion top and tail and the garlic in with
the chicken skins; salt lightly and remove the dish
to a preheated (or not, as you choose) 250-300F oven.
Cook for an hour or until the gribbenes are crunchy
and the skins are all rendered out into nice clear
yellow fat. Remove the onion trimmings and discard
or put into the soup vegetable bag. Remove the garlic,
mash, and set aside. Remove the gribbenes and eat.
If your friends are very good ones, you may choose
to share with them. Warning: gribbenes can cause some
extremely selfish behavior. My friend Dave's grandma
frequently used to make chopped liver for the family,
and until the afternoon of 12/12/16, he had never
tasted gribbenes or even heard of them. This implies
to me that his bubbe liked cracklings more than she
liked the family.
Take as much of the fat as you think is necessary
and roast or fry the onion and the chicken livers
(chopped or whole, doesn't matter too much) until
done. Let cool. Note: when doing this for myself,
I keep the livers kind of red inside, which gives
the finished product a to me appetizing pink. This
was a proper Jewish chopped liver, which means that
the meat was cooked until no pink remained. It hurt
me to do this. Season during cooking with salt, pepper,
and sherry if using. Let the livers cool until easy to
handle, then chop them pretty fine with a knife. You
may use a blender or processor, but that makes an
inauthentic texture. You may also start mashing with
a fork, if you want it smoother than your knife skills
will allow but less so than a blender would make. Mix
with the cooked minced onion and the juice and schmaltz
from the cooking dish.
Boil a couple eggs hard. Chop as fine as practicable,
at most 1/8", and stir into the livers along with the
mashed garlic and some chopped parsley, if that makes
you happy. Beat in more schmaltz to creamify the
texture as desired. Do a final taste for seasoning
with salt and pepper or a little raw onion.
Serve alone as a blob on a plate or with crusty
bread or (shudder) lettuce.
Source: moi, as made at Hungry Dave's in Waltham MA
on 12/12/16
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