Rocking Breakfast – Recipe #10

Does anyone remember the Rocking Breakfast posts? The last one was all the way back in June. Chef Josh Coletto shared his recipe for buttermilk biscuits.

For those who may have forgotten, I first met Josh years ago when he came to town and put The Flying Chicken on the map. This young chef and drummer brought his CIA training and skills picked up in kitchens across the country to elevate everyday comfort food to higher heights. With a common friend in chef Noah Sheetz, we also both participated with the Chefs Consortium.

Now Josh is now down at Local 111 the executive chef of the Darrow school and coming up to Albany for his monthly Rock N Roll Brunch pop-up at The Low Beat. He’s also got his fingers in a few other pots, so to speak. And I can’t quite remember how this all started, but Josh and I worked out a deal. I would remind people about the upcoming brunch in exchange for one of Josh’s recipes.

I still feel like I’m getting the better end of this deal. So you might ask yourself, if this deal was so great, why hasn’t there been a post since June. Well, I’ll let Josh answer that in his own words.

It’s been a couple months and I’ve certainly been staying busy. After a pig slaughter in Idaho, a trip to an amazing permaculture garden in Holyoke and a murder mystery party at Ten Broeck Mansion (along with a million other things) I think it’s time I submit another recipe.

Slaughtering and butchering a pig certainly doesn’t make me crave meat in any way, but one thing that had to be done is make a fairly traditional pate with the still warm liver.

So here it is, Pork Liver Pate.

You don’t need to kill a pig and use its fresh liver for your pate, but I do recommend finding a pig farmer that raises their animals right to get your liver.

Pork Liver Pate

1 pork liver
3 Tbs bacon fat
3 shallots, sliced
4 cloves garlic, minced
⅛ – ¼ cup bourbon
¼ cup cream
1 tsp fish sauce
1 tsp black pepper

1) Clean the pork liver, being sure you remove any connective tissue. Slice the liver into ½-in thick sections. Add the liver to a bowl and then cover it with milk. Refrigerate at least an hour.

2) Melt the bacon fat in a skillet and add the shallots. Season with salt and cook over medium heat until the start to caramelize. Don’t rush and cook until a nice deep brown is reached. Add the garlic to pan and saute briefly.

3) Add the liver making sure to get off as much of the milk as you can. Sprinkle with salt and pepper then heat gently until the livers are cooked on the outside and still slightly pink on the inside. This goes fast!

4) Carefully add the entire contents of the skillet to your food processor. Add in 1/8 cup of bourbon, fish sauce and 1/4 cup of cream. Puree for several minutes, stopping to scrape the sides as needed.

5) Taste the pâté and adjust the bourbon, salt and pepper to your personal tastes. Puree one last time getting everything very smooth.

This next step is optional, but will make for an ultra smooth non grainy pate. Do it!

6 ) Using a fine mesh sieve and a rubber spatula, push the pate through into another container, this will take some time and make you feel incredibly impatient.

Cover the pate with plastic wrap, pressing it against the top surface so no crust develops. Refrigerate or start eating immediately. This pate goes great with some pickled onions, dijon mustard and some crusty bread. Also, make some bahn mi sandwiches and have yourself a picnic.

The hardest part of this recipe is not bingeing on the pate.

So the pate is not on this week’s menu. That was a special Iowa treat. A treat which I didn’t get to enjoy, but this sounds so easy that I’m tempted to try it at home.

If I could make it to The Low Beat this Sunday, you could bet I’d be getting the Eggs in Purgatory. Josh makes his with heirloom tomato, chile, cannellini beans, a sous vide egg, grana padano, and house bread. This is the time for late season tomatoes to get slow roasted to coax out any sweetness they may have in ‘em.

I’m not sure which farms are supplying which foods, but Josh has been working with The Abode (New Lebanon, NY), Kinderhook Farm (Valatie, NY), and Climbing Tree Farms (New Lebanon, NY) on this menu.

This may be the last month where you don’t have to wait outside in the bitter cold to get a table at the Rock N Roll Brunch. It’s a bummer I can’t come. So you’ll have to go in my place and tell me what I missed.

Speaking of weekend events, Saturday is the 6th Annual Tour de Donut. We’ve got some people signed up, enough to make it fun, but I’m really surprised that more people aren’t jumping on this outing. I’m wondering if it’s the pace of the adventure. Maybe over the past six years everyone has sped up to the point where it’s impossible to dedicate most of the day to the pursuit of eating donuts.

If you have any suggestions, thoughts, or criticism, I’m all ears.