I bought one pack of chicken livers from the supermarket. The pack weight was somewhere north of 400 grams or just about a pound. This provided enough for two generously sized starters. It might have fed four people if said people were supermodels. (I had invited Kate Moss, but she had a clash of commitments - again!) Three people could have had a smallish starter from the same quantity, but as we weren't going to have a main course, I don't feel too guilty about the quantity used.
Firstly, I washed and dried the livers and then removed any of the greenish bits that can sometimes be present. In Spain they often seem to include the hearts in with the livers and I have no problem with that. (Strangely enough, chicken livers seem to be a staple in every Spanish butcher's, but not on menus: nor have I ever been given them in anybody's house.) I peeled and finely chopped 3 good sized cloves of garlic and added them to some hot olive oil in a saute pan. Then I threw in a few chilli flakes and let them cook for a couple of minutes. Next the chicken livers were added to the pan, which was by now on a medium heat. I let them acquire some colour and then put the lid on the pan to speed up the process. Once they have had about 5 minutes they are done, but as I am always a bit nervous about cooking offal, and as I am a firm believer in the belt and braces approach, I gave them another 3 minutes, before adding half of glass of the Sherry to the pan, taking the lid off, and turning up the heat a fraction. Once all the alcohol had been cooked out of the Sherry, I turned the heat down to the minimum and added a good tablespoon of creme fraiche. (Today's top tip: you can tell when the alcohol has evaporated by sniffing the steam coming from the pan. When the vapour no longer stings the eyes and nose, the alcohol has gone.) When the creme fraiche had formed a creamy sauce I added half a handful of chopped, flat-leaf parsley and served with some toast.
With the mushrooms I started with a pack of chestnut mushrooms and a pack of mixed exotic mushrooms - both from the same supermarket. My first task was to wipe the mushrooms with kitchen towel to remove any of the growing medium or other stuff that you don't want. I then finely chopped them. In a separate frying pan, I heated up some olive oil and when it was hot enough added some garlic and chilli. Once that had cooked for a couple of minutes, I put the mushrooms into the pan. At that moment the mushrooms were almost spilling out of the pan, but once they had lost some of their water content, there was plenty of room in the pan. I always find with cooking mushrooms that they shrink once they lose some of their moisture, but after that, they release a second quantity of liquid into the pan. In my experience they taste better - with a more intentse flavour - once this second lot of liquid has evaporated. Once this had ocurred, I added another tablespoon of creme fraiche, let it form a sauce and, as with the chicken livers, added half a handful of chopped, flat-leaf parsley at the last moment, before serving on toast. Success. Place in the first team squad assured once more. Toy Story 3
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