When I asked for Dola’s help to create an advent calendar full of fun stuff for you all, I requested the recipe for Mrs Glendinning’s Lemon curd cupcakes.

Yeah, but no. 😳

Juniper offered her recipe for Spilling the Tea Pâté as featured in the Valkyries are Flying, a short novel/long novella in the next book in the Midlife Recorder series. So I bit her hand off on behalf of us all.

I’ve tried it. It’s delicious. I didn’t manage to taste the magical three-day-old version because I’m an idiot and didn’t follow her tip.
But it still threw a party in my mouth, especially when I read her message carefully and got the recipe for the sourdough crackers to accompany it.

The first time I had it was with that day’s sourdough loaf.

Juniper’s recipe and notes

Ingredients

1 lb (500g) chicken livers
Chopped garlic or garlic seasoning
8 oz (250g) butter + 150g butter (for the seal)
One large finely chopped onion.
2 oz or 50ml (minimum) cheap brandy
Herbs, spices, salt, pepper, Worcestershire/Tabasco sauce – more guidance in my notes.

OK, those are the ingredients.
Now let’s spill the tea.

As much garlic as you like – I probably use too much, humans sometimes use none. As long as you like the result, it doesn’t matter, but … fry it off slowly with the chopped onions, and you’ll barely notice anything except the depth of flavour it gives the whole dish. If you’re not a vampire, 5-6 cloves is about perfect.

You can finely chop an onion, or you could use frozen ready-chopped as I do – honestly, life is too short, even for Hobs, to chop onions.

It should be a good ladleful of brandy—any old cheap stuff will do. A quick guide to quantity would be a bit more than you think you should add will be less than it wants. Any supermarket’s own brand is perfect. I recommend Tesco.com but many Hobs these days prefer Aldi. And their own-label cognac is cheap and cheerful. Splash away.

If you’re teetotal, add extra Worcestershire sauce or Tabasco, ginger or even cajun spice. Anything that hits the back of the throat just a little – otherwise it’s just sad mushy chicken innards.

Any herbs that are handy, assuming you like them.

A sprinkle of any spices you like.

Slightly more salt than your doctor wants you to have and black pepper to taste but be told more is better.

Method

Melt half the butter in a frying pan. Add the onions until they soften.

Crush the garlic and fry it until it browns. 

Pour the whole lot into a good blender. Whizz it a little.
Melt the other half of the butter in the same pan. Once it’s hot, add the chicken livers.

Stir the livers around until they change colour and the foaming butter begins to fill with meat juices. I’m lazy and tend to chop the livers in half on a spatula at this stage to make sure they’re cooked and speed things up. If they’re still super pink, chop more and dump them back in the butter.

Now add the brandy. 

MAJOR TIP: Pollun has only just learned this one. Mags says his eyebrows will grow back with help from Morven.

Cooks set fire to the brandy because the flames burn off the alcohol that would otherwise give the dish a bitter taste. But it leaves the aroma of the brandy behind.
(“No, Lis this is not ‘a waste’ this is cookery,”)

Chef’s tip is to pour the brandy into a metal ladle and hold it over the ring/burner of the stove until it’s warm. 

Light it, still in the ladle, and pour it, still flaming blue, into the pan.

Swirl (don’t stir) the pan gently until the flames die.  
Please avoid setting your cooker hood on fire as Pollun also now knows. As if the funeral pyre that was once his eyebrows wasn’t enough.

Once the flames die down, and it’s cooled slightly, pour the entire panful into the blender along with the pre-zapped onions.
Stir, blend, stir some more. If it’s too thick add a little more liquid. I favour port, sherry or a dash of Worcestershire sauce, but a drop of water will do just fine.
Blend until it resembles baby applesauce. 

Decant into ramekins or little plastic freezer pots, I like the glass ones that come free with those dessert pots. Decanting while it’s still warm will allow it to settle better.

Heat 1/4 lb butter until it melts and pour it over the top of the individual dishes. About 3mm or 1/8 inch thick. This ensures an airtight seal. So it will keep in a fridge (a week with an unbroken butter seal) or in a freezer (up to 6 months) with no oxidation.

The next day you will have a good pâté.

Two days later, you will have a great pâté

Three days later (if you can hide a ramekin at the back of the fridge that long), you will have a dish that has matured into the transformative.
The smell alone drives cats wild and makes everyone think you’re a witch in the kitchen. Three-day-old pâté adds a lot of oomph to whatever spell you want to cast on it.

Serve it with whatever you like. I favour sourdough crackers (recipe is available on request) snippets of crispy bacon, a good glass of wine and a Hugh Grant movie — but you do you.
Juniper Hob

Everyone at Hobson’s Choice sends you Festive Wishes, Happiness and Sweet Dreams throughout the twelve days of Yule.

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