Liver

[born toulouse]

Liver

Most offal is great when it is cooked well. I've gradually overcome my reluctance to tuck in and now reckon that hearts, livers, kidneys, brains, gizzards and fried pig's ears are all top eating if prepared by a skilled cook who knows the food. Mind you, they are mostly vomit inducing bilge when cooked by me.

Tripe stands out as truly horrible whoever does whatever to it.

[hobbes]

Liver

Fair point WE. Asparagus does indeed rock, as does tenderstem (cross between brocolli and kale.)

[Mumpo]

Liver

Liver is really dry. When you prepare it, it cons you into thinking it's going to taste all moist and succulent, flopping from palm to palm as you fling it around like a wet flannel. But once it's cooked, and you put some in your mouth, its spongy consistency immediately soaks up every particle of saliva. It's impossible to roll your tongue around your mouth after eating a mouthful of liver - there's just too much friction.

[Wyatt Earp]

Liver

I reckon you must be overcooking it. It's quite hard to get right. If it's actually "rare" in the middle, it's a bit disgusting, and if it's at all well-done it's very dry, as you say. But slightly pink, it's lovely, I think. You do need lots of butter in the pan.

For even more moisture, try swirling some madeira or something similar round the pan juices and pouring them over the liver. That's really lovely. It all soaks into the mash, for one thing. And it needn't clash with your onion gravy: you can get your fried onion fix by instead just caramelising some onions and serving them "dry".

Oh, man, we've got no liver in the freezer and I really fancy some now.

[Wyatt Earp]

Liver

Oh, and you know what, I have actually had tripe I've liked. It was in Valencia, as a racion. It was served stewed in a tomato and garlic sauce, and I was expecting to hate it but did't at all.

Good call on gizzards, they're lovely. Sweetbreads are the offal kings though.

[ad hoc]

Liver

I suspect Mumpo isn't actually looking for liver cooking tips

[Wyatt Earp]

Liver

Oh right, yeah. Sorry.

[Brandenburger Toro]

Liver

Tripe is lovely, you're all weird.

[Ginger Yellow]

Liver

I've had pigs ears in Spain. They were not very nice - very cartilagy, unsurprisingly. Pigs lips, on the other hand - very tasty.

[The Exploding Vole]

Liver

In Germany, the family I stayed with fried liver with slices of bananas and served it with boiled rice. Has anybody else eaten this?

[Guest]

Liver

Significant chunks of German history can be explained by the awfulness of German food.

[Wyatt Earp]

Liver

I don't think that's true. Either that German food is uniformly awful (I'm not having anyone knocking Sauerbraten or Nurnberg sausage or a good veal Schnitzel) or that its quality or lack of it explains a damn thing.

I realise it was a gag, but you know, as Eddie Waters said to Gethin Price, a joke must express a truth.

[Guest]

Liver

I'd happily knock Sauerbraten, given that it was traditionally horsemeat. And Schnitzel is Italian, or, more accurately, Milanese - and they have the sense not to serve it with laxative jam, unlike the Germans. So, yeah, German food is pretty much awful.

The Second World War is pretty tidily explained by German efforts to (at first) get a decent meal - the Italian alliance goes a long way to satisfying this, of course - and (later) to establish some kind of global gastronomic hegemony. With Italian food locked up, and Japanese food also available, the next phase of expansion is into Eastern Europe, until the Germans realise that, well, it really isn't worth it.

So, eyes turn west; where better to get your hands on haute cuisine than France? And where better to get some nice after-dinner chocolates than Belgium? Holland has to be passed through to get to France, sure, but it is administered differently (military, not party, control) as Dutch food is even worse than German. Aerial reconnaissance of England reveals it to be a total no-hoper, and the Germans have enough domestic pork foodstuffs to avoid anything but an arms-length relationship with Spain.

With jaded palettes screaming for variety, the Germans cast around desperately for new, exciting, inspiring meals. North Africa is the first stop (who doesn't like Moroccan food?), although an unfortunate foray down the Balkans and into Greece proves a gastronomic disaster, culminating in the discovery (post bloody airborne invasion) that all Crete has to offer is fucking kolokythokeftedes. Scanning their encyclopaedia, the Germans realise that, with their Japanese allies taking a grip on China (the bits with good food, at last) and SE Asia, the only significant untouched gastronomic resource is the Subcontinent. And to get there they've got to go through the Middle East or Russia. Cue the drive on Egypt and Barbarossa. The first fails because, unable to ship enough blanquette de veau to their troops, they're forced to live off captured British rations; the second because there is only so much borscht one man can take. Inevitably, the war ends with the victory of the only two countries with even worse food, Russia and the U.S.A.

It works for other periods, too, albeit not quite so well. Except for the Diet of Worms, obviously.

[Wyatt Earp]

Liver

Raskolnikov wrote:

I'd happily knock Sauerbraten, given that it was traditionally horsemeat.

Actually, I'd knock the Rhinelanders mainly for converting to beef in that cowardly way. The South Netherlands version served in and around Maastricht, zoervlees, still uses horse when at it's most authentic, and the horsemeat one I had was really good; better than the touristy beef one I also had.

[Guest]

Liver

A standing up "Bravo!" from for that one, Raskolnikov. Gave me a good laugh.