When there's a 7 Kilo lump of belly pork, 1½ Kilos of hand of pork, and a good sized duck foie gras, all together on the kitchen table, there's only one thing to do;... make next year's Paté.
Last year, and in 2010, I slightly under-salted my Paté, so this year I've done what I should have done previously, and fried up a small amount of the mixture, to taste before bottling. One needs to put a lot more salt in than one imagines. Grammes of salt, per kilo of meat, mean nothing; taste is the only way. I'm hoping I've got it right this time, it certainly seemed so.
And here's the result. Above are my ten cooled and cleaned 200 gm jars; I'll process another eight 350 gm jars today.
I'm just doing my 'Special Paté' this year. A good coarse peasant Paté with a walnut sized heart of foie gras in each jar.
I'm just doing my 'Special Paté' this year. A good coarse peasant Paté with a walnut sized heart of foie gras in each jar.
Our ordinary 'every-day' Paté for 2013 will be bought ready made. I've discovered some wonderful commercial Patés over the years (especially certain espelette flavoured Basque Patés), and it's simply not worth my time bothering to try to better them.
N.B. If you wish to see how I do everything, type Paté 2011 into the little white box on the top left hand corner of my page, click the search button, and it'll come up (é = AltGr + e).
