Nikas Culinaria

Growing up, my mom would feed us homemade whole wheat bread and forbade sodas and sweets and junk foods of all types. We had our own garden (an acre plot in Iowa, anything would grow in that dirt) and we ate out of it in the summers. My mom grew up on a farm so she loved to serve us some foods that may not be on all of America’s dinner table, things like pig brains, head cheese, and liver (although, liver is much more common than the other two).

I remember fondly the pig brains dredged in crushed saltines and sauteed in butter. It was so creamy and decadent. I ate lots of head cheese until my mom described what it was. I was off the head cheese after that. Sorry mom.

My Colombian heritage brought deep fried pork skin (chicharrones), tripe (mondongo), and cow’s tongue to the table.

Of all this, my favorite has always been liver. Chicken livers (Church’s Fried Chicken in San Antonio, Texas had THE best), calf livers, beef livers, you name it. I adore liverwurst too. I remember a place in San Antonio called Momma’s Hofbrau that served WICKED liver and onions. Sadly, it seems, that restaurant no longer exists.

On occasion, I make liver at home because I need and want it and don’t really ever see it on restaurant menus. My poor husband, who hates liver, has to endure the smell but its just a necessity!

The dish in the photos here is very simple to make. Toast some bread, cut a circle out with a biscuit cutter, butter it, put it aside. Slice half a large Vidalia onion into rings and saute in butter and olive oil on medium low heat. DO not burn them but do get some browning on the surface. Please don’t cook them so long that they desiccate away. Remove to a plate. Add some more oil and butter to the same pan and then grab some fresh and de-membraned liver. Salt it and put that side down into the medium heat pan. Cook until you can see that it is about half done (you can see that from looking at the side of the liver). Flip and cook until the level of bloodiness that you like. Try not to dry it out! Remember, there is carry over heat so it will cook even more than what you have when you first take it out of the pan. Saute a few spinach leaves in the same pan to pick up some of those juices.

Assemble as you like.

I put some spinach down, then the toast round, then some onions, a piece of liver cut into a circle shape, and then the sauteed spinach and more onions. Sprinkle with chunky sea salt.

Enjoy!

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