Liver pâté is something of a scandinavian cultural phenomenon. Whereas in the rest of the world it’s practically unheard of, in scandinavia you can find store bought liver pâté on every breakfast table. For most people that’s where it stops, but scandinavian cooks and foodies who enjoy making their own have been serving liver pâté for dinner and making fancy seasonal variants for almost 200 years.
I have eaten and loved it all my life, and in fact I like it so much that even though I’m not the type of person to look for keto alternatives to food I had to find a suitable bread substitute that could serve as a liver pâté vessel. I should also mention that I’m not otherwise much of a liver person (at least as an adult I’ve been so far unable to make it edible), and neither are most of my fellow scandinavians who enjoy liver pâté on their sandwiches every day, so even if you don’t like liver you shouldn’t let that stop you from trying this recipe.
There are many ways to make it with the most famous being “dansk leverpostej” (danish liver pâté). If you go looking up other recipes online (which is great for inspiration, be prepared to use google translate to find the best recipes in danish or norwegian) you’ll find that most recipes use some amount of wheat flour or potato starch, but only a small amount that would still be within keto limits. The recipe I show here only contains a small amount of onions and some spices as the only source of carbs and should therefore be extremely low carb.
Making liver pâté is not an exact science by any means so you’re really free to experiment. The very basic ingredient list is something like
- 2 parts lean meat (of which at least 1 part liver, but it can be both parts. Preferentially pork liver and meat, but you can use beef or lamb too)
- 1 part fat (preferentially unrendered pork fat, but it can really be whatever edible fat you want)
- a small amount of eggs
- salt, pepper and other spices
- often some sauce like béchamel, but you can also find recipes with cream sauces or no sauce at all (adding sauce would decrease the amount of other fat you need)
You can really change the recipes up, use different spices, different ratios of liver, meat and fat, food from different animals, even other organ meats such as lungs, heart or kidneys to come up with your own variants. One very common theme is to use 1 part liver and 1 part fatty meat, such as pork belly. You can really use whatever fat you want, be that pure unrendered lard or suet, fatty meat, butter or even vegetable oil should you be so inclined (I would stay away from non-animal fat, and also cod liver oil. Does anyone actually cook anything with fish oil??).
Traditionally liver pâté was made in late fall/winter when the pigs were butchered, so most recipes contain the christmas spices (allspice, nutmeg and clove). This specific recipe is extra christmas-y just because it’s a little generous with the spice amounts while other variants cut back or leave out nutmeg and/or clove entirely. You can also go different directions, e.g. italian with rosemary, oregano, capers, garlic etc. It would be a mistake to not mention that fried bacon crumbs or bits is a very popular addition, either mixed in with the pâté dough, or sprinkled on top, maybe with sauteed mushrooms, bell pepper and onion rings and covered in aspic to make it extra fancy.
Okay, on to the recipe proper:
- 500g liver
- 400g lean pork mince
- 600g pork fat (or any other fat you want)
- 2 eggs
- 2 small onions (or 1 large)
- 6 to 8 anchovy fillets (optional, but if you leave it out you have only yourself to blame)
- 4 to 6 tsp ground nutmeg
- 4 to 6 tsp ground clove
- 4 tsp ground allspice
- 2 tsp salt
- 2 to 4 tsp black pepper (ground or whole is up to you)
- 1/2 tsp cayenne pepper (not enough to taste, just to give it some edge)
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If there are any large visible bits of connective tissue on the liver throw those away. If the pork fat still has skin attached remove that too. Cut it all into pieces that will fit your meat grinder or food processor.
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Grind up the liver and fat together until it’s relatively fine. If you use unrendered pork fat you’re going to need a real meat grinder, but if you use rendered lard or some other fat this can be done in a food processor.
After going through once on medium: -
Add the other ingredients and grind/process some more until it becomes a medium to fine paste. You shouldn’t be able to tell bits from each other (unless it’s whole pepper and you’re into that).
Everything added and gone through the grinder again with a fine mesh: -
Pour the paste into baking trays and put them in a water-filled container in a pre-heated oven.
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Bake the pâté at 175C for 65-70 minutes, or until the internal temperature becomes 76C. Remove from the oven and let it cool down until it’s edible.
You can serve it warm or cold and it will keep in the fridge for at least a week. It can safely be frozen, and if you want to make multiple dinners of it you can also freeze the raw paste and cook that when you need it.