Chicken Liver and Tarragon Pate

Yesterday amongst several deliveries I had arranged to arrive, including a new shoe rack, in order to make more room under the bed for storage of kitchen items (ah the joys of a rented room and a small kitchen!), was a Forman and Field hamper, on behalf of Knorr aka the stock people, full of edible goodies!

Within my little hamper, it included all the ingredients to make a Marco Pierre White recipe for Chicken Chausseur. Now please forgive me as I will no doubt change my mind at a future date but the recipe just was not screaming out to me to make it. For one it had a lot of tomatoes in, something that I shouldn't eat in huge quantities anyway and I don't know what else, but it just didn't appeal. It seems Chicken Chausseur is a pretty classic bistro style dish but I have never tried it, one day perhaps!

One of the items was a whole organic chicken, complete with a little bag of the innards. Now being the type of person who hates waste and not needing to make any stock any time soon thanks to a stash of Knorr stock pots, my head started scheming and within the bags contents I thought I identified the liver, gave them a quick trim, going from a memory of making liver parfait a few years back and decided to knock up possibly the tiniest portion of pate to start our meal with!
The pate was very easy to make, and surprisingly delicious, though preferably make it in advance and not whilst making your main course but there again I do love a challenge and nothing makes me more content than creating a gigantic pile of washing up and getting to eat at the end of it all!

I used various bits supplied in the hamper and ingredients I had lying around - the best kind of cooking I think! Whilst I used whipped cream making the pate, regular double cream will be just fine - I had previously frozen a tub picked up on reduced, hence it being already whipped.

Makes 1 portion

1 Chicken liver, trimmed of nasty bits and roughly chopped
1/4 banana shallot, finely diced
1 sprig tarragon leaves, finely chopped + one leaf for garnishing
1 heaped tsp butter
1 heaped tbsp whipped double cream
1 tbsp brandy
s&p to taste

Heat the butter, add the shallots and gently cook for a couple of minutes, add the liver and fry until just pink inside and cooked outside, add the brandy and allow to evaporate off slightly and remove from the heat.

Scrape the contents of the pan into a small chopper and blitz with the tarragon, cream and seasoning. Adjust to taste with seasoning and extra cream if desired.

Place the pate into a suitable serving dish, or whatever you can find at the time - mine was a rather beautiful and delicate Laura Ashley flower cup, garnish with a little extra tarragon and then chill until required.

Serve with a granary roll. Or similar. Fortunately my dad had received my telepathic message and had turned up with a pack of rolls!

I will have some more recipes to follow shortly with what happened to the rest of the chicken!

Thanks to Knorr and Jen at Golin Harris

Disclaimer: All recipes are my own and I have been provided with the ingredients only.