When I was looking for a terrine recipe to test out, I wondered if I’d need to buy liver as part of my preparations. I just didn’t know if liver was a standard ingredient in terrines! I researched the question and decided to write a helpful post about what I learned.
Does terrine contain liver? Yes and no.
Terrines can be made with a variety of livers including chicken, beef, pork, duck, goose, rabbit and lamb. However, not all terrine recipes call for liver so, unlike with spreadable pâté (aka liver pâté), liver isn’t an essential ingredient for terrines.
Many people decide to use liver in terrines based on whether they like liver as a standalone ingredient. But because liver is only one of several meats in a terrine, you don’t have to love the taste of liver to love a terrine that contains liver—especially if you use the soaking method popularized by chef, Raymond Blanc.
Making terrines with and without liver
Terrines made with liver typically contain these ingredients as well:
- Meat, such as pork and game.
- Spices, including juniper, mace and allspice.
- Port, brandy or wine.
- Heavy cream.
- Eggs.
- Bacon, caul or thin slices of fatback (to wrap the terrine in before cooking).
- Breadcrumbs and milk (sometimes).
Types of liver you can use to make terrines:
- Chicken liver.
- Beef liver, including liver from calves.
- Pork liver.
- Duck liver.
- Goose liver.
- Lamb liver.
- Rabbit liver.
- Cod liver (though this tends to be associated more with pâté than terrines).
Liver taste profiles to keep in mind when making terrine
All livers don’t taste the same. Livers that come from bigger and older animals tend to have a stronger flavour. For example, beef and pig livers have a stronger liver taste than livers from chickens, geese, lambs, ducks and rabbits. Liver from calves has a milder taste than liver from older cows.
Liver flavour is also influenced by what the animals ate and the freshness of the liver.
If liver isn’t fresh or it’s gone bad, there’s nothing you can do to save it. Toss it in the green bin rather than using it in your recipe. Smell the liver to determine its freshness. If there’s an ammonia smell, it’s bad. If it smells fresh or clean, it’s good. You can also get an idea of the freshness by how the liver looks. The colour should be bright, and the surface of the liver should look moist, not slimy.
Where to buy liver for terrines
You’ll likely be able to find the common livers—beef and chicken—at your grocery store. For other livers—such as duck, rabbit, lamb and goose—you’ll probably have the best luck at a local butcher shop. And if you buy from a butcher shop, you might want to talk to your butcher or meat hawker to find out about standard availability and when the best time to buy liver is. I once went to the butcher to buy chicken livers and they were out of all liver, even in the freezer in the back of the shop. That caught me by surprise.
Making terrines without liver
To make a terrine without liver, look for recipes that don’t call for liver. If you’re a beginner terrine maker like me, this is the simplest route. It’s much to use a liver-free recipe than figuring out what substitutions to make with a recipe that includes liver. If you’re seasoned when it comes to forcemeat and substitutions, then use any recipe you like and use your experience to make the right liver substitutes.
What’s the difference between pate and terrine?
The Encyclopædia Britannica defines pâté en terrine as “a meat, game, or fish mixture wrapped in suet or other animal fat or lining and cooked in a deep oval or oblong dish, without pastry, and served cold.” In English, we shorten this term to terrine.
Pâté means paste in French. Think of pâté as the umbrella term. But, generally in British and North American usage, we say pâté to refer to smooth and finely textured forcemeat dishes made with liver. We generally call chunkier versions terrine or country pâté. However, in Brian Polycyn and Michael Ruhlman’s book, Pâté, Confit, Rillette: Recipes from the Craft of Charcuterie, even their classic pork pâté has chunky parts in it.
Some people say pâtés and terrines have different cooking methods but that doesn’t seem to hold. Pâtés are either cooked in the oven in a water bath like terrines or cooked on the stove, blended, strained (not always) and placed in a serving dish.
Why use liver in a terrine?
So, we know that you don’t have to use liver in a terrine but there are a couple of good reasons to experiment with terrine recipes that contain liver.
3 reasons to use liver in a terrine:
- Liver is cheap. Today, as I write this article, Walmart sells one pound of Tender Year Brand Sliced Beef Liver for $2.48 USD. And, if you’re a savvy shopper, I’m sure you could find liver on sale for even less.
- Liver is nutritious. Healthline.com calls liver a “nutrient-dense superfood.” It comes with plenty of iron, copper, choline, vitamin A and the B vitamins (B2, B9, B12).
- You can handle it. Unlike your tortured childhood experiences of not being able to leave the table until the liver was done (is that just me?), you’re more likely to enjoy terrine with liver now that your palette is more refined. There’s no harm in trying a small terrine recipe with liver to give it a second try.
So, you may be thinking…
Can you make liver terrine if you don’t like liver?
The answer could be yes. I’ve heard people say, “I hate liver, but I love pâté.” I’ve said this myself while eating kosher chicken liver mousse out of the jar. (Thank you, Sanagan’s Meat Locker!)
Stephanie Le, creator of I am a Food Blog, said on her Momofuku for 2 site, “I used to be one of those people that didn’t like liver…Now that I’m a grown up (most of the time) I love liver, especially in terrines and pâtès; when liver’s done right, it’s transcendental.”
I can’t promise you that adding liver to your terrines will put you on a higher plane of enlightenment, of course. But I can give you some tips to increase the likelihood of that happening.
First, try liver from the mild-tasting list of tiny animals: chicken, rabbit, duck, etc. Don’t start with beef liver.
Second, let some of the liver tang ooze out by soaking the liver first.
Toning down the liver taste in your terrine: Soaking options
There are multiple options for soaking liver so experiment until you find one that works the best for you (or, if soaking the liver is part of your recipe, follow that method).
| Soaking ingredients | About this method | Toss or keep the soaking liquid? |
|---|---|---|
| Milk and salt water | Chef Raymond Blanc is known for soaking liver, including the milder-tasting chicken liver. In his Chicken Liver Parfait recipe, he soaks 14 ounces of liver in 500 ml milk, 500 ml water and two teaspoons of salt. | Toss. |
| Brandy | In his Tales from the Larder series, Patric Juillet suggests soaking one pound of goose livers in half a glass of apricot brandy (glass size not specified) in his Goose Liver Terrine recipe. | Add it to the terrine! |
| Lemon water | Kimi Harris from the Nourishing Gourmet blog says that soaking liver in lemon water “helps the texture and taste” and liver pâté is how she first started to like eating liver. Use the juice of a lemon in the water. | Toss. |
How to clean and trim liver for your terrine
Whether or not you soak liver, you must clean and trim it properly before adding it to your terrine ingredients. Clean the livers by giving them a quick rinse in your colander and then use a paper towel to pat them dry. Trim off sections that look green and remove the connecting membranes (which are white). You can remove the membrane by pulling them off with your fingers, using a knife or using your kitchen shears.
Conclusion
That’s it, folks. Terrine doesn’t have to include liver but if you want to expand your forcemeat repertoire (and maybe have a transcendental experience), why not give terrine with liver a try?