Pork/Chicken Liver Pate for Banh Mi

Banh mi without good pate and mayonnaise feels almost naked and incomplete. While you can find decent premade pate in specialty stores and at Lee's sandwiches, nothing beats making your own--and it's not that hard to do. In the past, we used Jacque Pepin's quick and delicious recipe for pate by sauteing chicken/pork liver, onions, garlic, and bay leaf and then transferring the mixture to a food processor and adding butter and cognac before pureeing until smooth.

More recently, we tried White on Rice Couple's method of baking the pate which has more spices and uses ground pork and bacon making it extra savory. It was great in our banh mi nem nuong and banh mi thit nuong.

We reduced a few of the quantities in Todd and Diane's recipe. Also instead of using caul, we used bacon. We left out star anise since we didn't have that on hand.

Pork/Chicken Liver Pate for Banh Mi (adapted from White on Rice Couple)
Printable Recipe (this makes over a 1lb worth of pate, which was much more then we need-- so feel free to reduce the ratio by half)

• 1 lb pork liver (or chicken or combination-trim any excess tissue and wash well and dab dry)
  
• 1/2 lb ground pork (for a smoother, more liver flavor pate, use less ground pork)
  
• 1/2 lb pork fat (or pork belly)
• 2 cloves garlic
• 2 shallots
• 1 whole egg and 1 egg yolk
  
• 1/2 ts cinnamon
• 1/2 ts coriander (ground or crushed)
• 1/2 ts cumin
• 1.5 ts salt
• 1 tbs coarse freshly cracked peppercorns
  
• 1 tbs cognac
• 2 bay leaves
• 1 package of bacon
• ceramic or baking pan
• large baking pan to use in water bath

Preheat oven to 350. Cut liver and pork fat into small pieces and add to food processor and give it a few pulses. Add ground pork, garlic, shallots, cinnamon, cumin, coriander, salt and pepper. Process until smooth.

In mixing bowl, incorporate the meat and liver mixture with the cognac and eggs. Line bottom of baking or ceramic pan with overlapping pieces of bacon. Place a bay leaf on the bottom and then fill with meat/liver mixture. Cover top with another bay leaf and then overlapping pieces of bacon.

Place in oven in the larger baking pan and add enough water to cover 2/3rds of the pan containing the meat/liver mixture. Bake for about 1-1.5 hrs. The pate will contract and the juices will be on the bottom. Allow to cool and soak up the juices/fat when cooling. Remove from pan and remove excess bacon and the bay leaves. You're ready to spread this delicious pate on banh mi or any other appetizers.

Stay tuned for the next post in this series on banh mi with making homemade mayonnaise and banh mi thit nuong.

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