What’s for Breakfast
October 25th, 2010 · 1 Comment · Posted in breakfast
Nothing like fried liver and eggs
Fried eggs over seared beef liver, sauteed beet greens on the side.
My wife and daughter hate it when I fry beef liver. They don’t even want to be in the kitchen. They say it’s because of the smell. Liver does have a singular aroma, and a unique flavore as well. I love it, especially because it’s so darn cheap compared to other forms of meat. Plus, I believe if we’re going to kill animals for food–such as beef cattle–we should be decent enough to eat the whole thing. Our culture has strayed from that philosophy, with the result that many people don’t know the pleasures of eating offal such as liver, tongue, kidneys, sweet breads, tripe. You can hardly find these items at the store anymore, so I’m glad that our local dairy not only offers them along with milk and cream but even delivers them to our door.
My method for cooking liver is to do so in a very hot pan with a little bacon grease in it. I like the liver well-browned, so a minute or so on each side is plenty. Season with salt and pepper.
Beet greens are also a special treat, one of the best our garden has to offer. Most people never taste beet greens because they don’t keep long at all. You have to harvest them fresh and cook them almost immediately. I usually refresh them in a sink full of water, then drop them dripping wet into a big skillet where I’ve sauteed some garlic in olive oil. Fabulous.
I love beet greens, too. After one enthusiastic trip to the farmer’s market, I ended up with a lot of beet greens that I couldn’t bear to just throw int he compost pile. I had never heard of anyone just eating them plain (sauteed), like kale or spinach. Since I had so much, I braised them and put them in the freezer in yogurt quart containers and add the braised greens to chicken & sausage gumbo. It is delicious, & everybody ate it.