SKINNIER LIVER PATE, Low-fat, Low-Cholesterol, Big Flavour, make ahead

Wonderfully guilt-free!

updated Dec 2024

Skinny Chopped Liver: low-fat, low cholesterol, big flavour
with  dill pickle spears

Food in the Middle East is wonderful - both simple and exotic.   Hot bread - fresh from an oven at a tiny downtown stall - slathered with unsalted butter and dripping with fresh honey. Or, over a border, delicate 'tablecloth' flatbread cooked on an upturned oval of thinly beaten metal, passed down from generation to generation.   And, in the foothills of purple Iranian mountains, a tiny bus-stop cafe with unadorned but unforgettable chicken and saffron rice.  

What strikes a visitor to the Middle East is the similarities in cuisine, not the differences.  Flavours are strong and gutsy, casseroles and stews are distinctive and assertive - even aggressive - and the recipes are steeped in traditions and prohibitions eons old.  The food could not reflect the peoples of the Middle East more.  

Chopped Liver (or Liver Pate) is almost an essential in parts of the Middle East.  It is greatly loved, and as one gentleman told me, is nothing without lashings of chicken fat.  

Not for 67goingon50, it isn't.

This version of chopped liver is a combination of a traditional-ish recipe (adapted from Ina Garten) and a Western creamy liver pate.  It was developed for the fat and cholesterol phobic.  There is no chicken fat though there is some dairy or plant butter.  It still packs a punch flavourwise and the yoghurt makes for an appealing layer of tanginess. 

For the Festive season, it's easy on the budget and packed full of iron. It looks good on a festive buffet table and makes a good starter course with toast or hot rolls. 

It's also easy to prepare and can sit in the fridge for a day or two before serving.  

Cost: depending on livers & the cupboard - from £2.50'ish to £4.50'ish
Makes: 5 cups; halves easily

Ingred:
   500 gms/16 oz chicken livers, pref. organic, trimmed & free of green spots
   5 tbsp dairy or plant butter or olive oil or a mix
   2 teacups med diced onions, about 2 whole onions (fodmap friendly - fennel) 
   1/3 cup madeira/sherry/grape juice
   4 eggs, hard boiled
   1/4 cup chopped fresh parsley
   2 tsp fresh thyme (fresh) or 1/3 rounded tsp dried
   2 tsp salt
   pinch cayenne

   3/4 cup strained fat-free plant yoghurt OR dairy Greek yoghurt

Method:

1. Saute chicken livers in 2 tbsp butter/oil for 5 mins (a couple of mins more if you like your livers well done); add to deep bowl, set aside
2. In the same pan add 3 tbsp butter/olive oil; saute onions/fennel over med high heat 10 mins, until soft & browned
3. Add alcohol; use fish slice to scrape away bits on the bottom of the pan; pour the contents over the livers
4. Reserve one cooked egg for garnish.  
5. Add the rest of the ingredients including the yoghurt to the livers
6. Blitz to the preferred texture; coarse or fine. (If fine, you may wish to pass the mixture through a fine-meshed sieve, squashing the contents with a ladle, to give a mousse-like texture).  Pour into a dish.
7. Separately grate white and yolk of remaining egg and arrange on top.  Refrigerate several hours or overnight, max 2 days
8. Serve on crackers, toast or rolls with dill pickle spears & tomatoes

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This recipe has been developed by B  Lee/ Bright Sun Enterprises and may not be reproduced, in any form, without the author's written permission.