Duck Liver Pate

Ingredients

Makes 350g

• 300g duck livers

• 1/2 medium onion

• 3 garlic cloves

• 125g unsalted butter

• 80ml port

• 6 fresh sage leaves

• salt and pepper

Method

Start by roughly dicing the onion and garlic, no need to be too exact here as everything will be blended later. In a frying pan add 25g of the butter and the chopped onions. Sweat these on a low heat for 8 mins.

Whilst those are doing you can prepare the livers, simply pat dry and then with a small sharp knife tease out the white connective sinew that you can see. I tend to do it by sliding the knife underneath until I can get a good grip then pulling it away. Again don't worry too much if any fall apart a bit, blending will hide any slip ups.

Now back to the pan, once the onions have sweated down add the garlic for 3 mins before turning the heat up to medium/high and adding in the livers. Fry these for about 5 minutes turning every so often until cooked through.

Next turn it back down and pour in the port, letting it bubble for 2 minutes until it has slightly thickened but there is still liquid there. Then throw in 50g more of the butter and rip up and chuck in the sage leaves. Once the butter has melted in take of the heat and leave to cool slightly.

Transfer the contents of the pan into a blender and whizz up, adding salt and pepper to taste. Once that is done spoon out into whatever dish you are serving in before melting the remaining 50g of butter and pouring over the top to create a seal. This will stop the change in colour you always get with pate when it is exposed to the air.

Chill completely before serving with some nice crusty bread.