Portuguese Liver the Finale…

I had an interruption in service last week in so much that my busy social schedule got in the way of me cooking up and gobbling up the Portuguese Liver dish that I prepared last week (see earlier post). It ended up in a plastic box in the freezer patiently waiting for another day…that day was yesterday!!!

Once defrosted I drained the marinade from the liver and kept it to one side; I have to tell you the smell was just so rich and zingy and I was really looking forward to testing the dish out! The liver was then fried for a couple of minutes in a dash of hot oil, turning occasionally. Usually when I fry liver it spits all over my kitchen and the clean up operation is extensive – because the liver had been in sauce and was not as dry as unprepared liver the spitting was minimal and didn’t make as much of a mess as normal…which I was quite pleased about because I had to go out almost immediately after wolfing down my dinner! Then I threw the marinade / sauce in and turned the heat up so that the liquid could boil and reduce for 10 minutes. I served with ordinary boiled long grain rice!

All in all the liver was a success, there was perhaps too much for me and as it’s such a rich meat I found myself spooning mouthfuls of rice and sauce and avoiding lots of the actual meat at once. The sauce itself is more citrusy than I expected and I’m more of a fan of it because of that fact! It dawned on me after eating the dish that there was no vegetable content whatsoever upon serving and this disturbed me somewhat! I was sat trying to think of what vegetable(s) I could serve with liver and rice and I’m still at a bit of a loss. Mushrooms perhaps? How nutritional can mushrooms be though? I’m pretty confident they are mostly water! Maybe some peas? However I’m not sure they would compliment the dish perfectly. Answers on a postcard please…..!!!!

Not so Offal...

I embarked upon my offal experimentations last night (whilst peeling 3 heads of garlic and adding them to the carrot mix for the carrot and garlic chutney, but that’s another story which will be told when it’s all safely in jars!)

Firstly I prepared the Portuguese Liver as it needs marinating overnight…some interesting ingredients in this one and not ones I would usually associate with liver, but as I mentioned I’ve really only had it with mash and gravy or on sandwiches covered in tomato ketchup (seriously try it!) anyway, the recipe calls for:

· 1 Garlic Clove, crushed
· Salt and Black Pepper
· 2 Bay Leaves, crumbled
· 150ml/5 fl.oz. Dry Red Wine
· Juice of 1 Lemon
· Juice of 1 Lime
· 450g/1lb Calves Liver
· 3 tbsp Oil

This amount serves 4 so I scaled it back for just little old me…incidentally the packet of liver is still probably too much for me and cost a grand total of 47p so I’m well on my way to a credit crunch defying meal.

To begin, put the garlic, seasoning, bay leaf, red wine and lemon & lime juice into a shallow dish. Cut the liver into slices and immerse in the marinade. Cover and refrigerate to marinate overnight. Simples!!! I’ve got to say it looks very nice and smells delightful, I’m still a little unsure about the mix of ingredients but it shall be cooked up tonight and the verdict will be recorded. I think I’ll serve it with some white rice.

I still had to make dinner for myself though and moved on to the next recipe: Kidneys with Noodles. I’d already decided that I wasn’t going to serve this dish with noodles, as I had none in, and instead substitute them with some linguine, which I did have in. No point buying in lots of ingredients at extra cost when I could get away with using something I had already in the cupboard eh? The packet of kidneys cost me £1.12p!!! I used 4 last night (halved and cored) and have put the remaining 5 fromthe packet into the freezer for another day. This is the very first time I’ve prepared kidneys for myself and I was concerned about the core…every recipe I’d seen has strongly urged the reader to ensure the cores are removed a process that I didn’t find particularly easy! I eventually had to leave a tiny bit of the core in one or two of the halves and I was worried that it would effect the end result, however it didn’t so I won’t be as finicky next time!

Again this recipe is for 4 so I scaled it back for just little old me again!

75g/3oz Dried Noodles (I used Linguine)

Salt and Black Pepper

450g/1lb Lambs Kidneys, halved and cored

Plain Flour for coating75g/

3oz Butter

1 Onion, finely chopped

1 Garlic Clove, crushed

50g/2oz Mushrooms, sliced

150ml/5fl.oz. Lamb Stock

1 teasp Dried Mixed Herbs (I didn’t have in my plethora of spices so substituted with a little Thyme)

While boiling up the dried pasta I sauteed the onion and garlic in the melted butter for about three minutes, then added the mushrooms which I tossed around for a few seconds before adding the kidney halves, which had been coated in the flour. I kept the mixture moving for the next 2-3 minutes so it didn’t stick to the pan and slowly added the lamb stock and thyme…the smell by this point was a really rich meaty smell and I’m not ashamed to admit it really began to make me hungry! The sauce came to the boil so I turned the heat down and left to simmer for a further 3-4 minutes and then served over the drained pasta.

IT WAS SCRUMMY! The kidney flavour wasn’t overpowering which I was slightly worried about because they are a very strong flavour…they were perhaps a little undercooked for anyone else but me – I like my meat to be squidgy, my mum (for example) doesn’t – so I would cook them for perhaps another 3-4 minutes for her. Overall though, I’m pretty sure I’ll be making this dish again…maybe even for guests (although I think I’d have to check their stance on offal, it’s not the most popular cut of meat amongst my other 20 something friends!)

Changing Shopping Habits...

After a spur of the moment defrosting of the freezer last week my stocks have run extremely low and I'm going to have to do a big shop at the supermarket in order to fill up again. The credit crunch is still raging so I've decided to try and gather some recipes for cheaper cuts of meat and offal in order to cut back on big bills! I enjoy offal but have previously only fried off a bit of liver to have in sandwiches (don't balk before you've tried it!!! I usually lather it in ketchup too which I'm only slightly ashamed of!) I've had the occasional kidney in a steak and kidney mix and my dad used to cook them up for a snack, but I've never put them into an actual recipe before so this should be interesting!

Searching around on the Internet has provided the usual liver and onions or liver and bacon recipes and I've also found a few other recipes which I was previously unfamiliar with - but they all seem a bit predictable! I know offal has been off the menu for a long time and was considered 'old fashioned' but surely someone has been writing recipes for liver / kidneys / heart etc?

The recipes I've collated are:

• Liver Portuguese
• Kidneys with Noodles
• Curried Kidneys
• Heart Ragout
• Lambs Liver Stroganoff
• Sauteed Lambs Kidneys with Mushrooms and Tarragon
• Oxtail with Herb Dumplings
• Lambs Kidney with two Mustard's
• Kidneys in Fresh Tomato Sauce
• Lambs Kidneys in Red Wine

I plan to try them two at a time...this week will be Liver Portuguese and Kidneys with Noodles, so I shall update on how they turn out. Does anyone have anything more exciting they can offer me? Perhaps with an oriental influence? I'm keen to keep the number and cost of ingredients down for the aforementioned reasons!!!