Essential ingredients for the Terrine de foie gras
Traditionally, a holiday meal in France features roast lamb, or some sort of poultry (chicken, turkey, goose or duck, or sometimes pintade (guinea fowl, in English), quail or pheasant, for the more adventuresome, or maybe even a capon, a castrated cockerel that is prized for its tenderness). Vegetarians, rare as they might be here, or anyone who wants something different, might put salmon (smoked, baked or grilled) on the menu.
There will likely be champagne, before or after eating, and the meal normally ends with a Bûche de Noël, a frosted sponge cake or ice cream log that, admittedly, I, a confirmed sweet tooth, have never developed a taste for. There have been one or two, in the more than dozen French Christmases that I’ve celebrated, which were good. But, for the most part, they’re very industrial-like, with a taste more akin to the “Yule log” that they’re named for, than a quality dessert.
One other mainstay of a French holiday table is duck or goose liver–foie gras, in French. France is the world’s leading producer and consumer of this delicacy. Wikipedia says that 19,000 tonnes of foie gras was consumed in France in 2005. Over 90% of that is duck liver, as it’s more difficult, evidently, to raise geese. Duck foie gras has a slightly musky taste, while goose foie gras is smoother and less gamy tasting. Like many people, I prefer goose foie gras, but it’s difficult to find, even here in southwestern France where much of the country’s foie gras is produced.
Duck liver it would have to be, then. Whole foie gras, made from one or two whole liver lobes, is what I wanted for our Christmas dinner. My one other experience preparing foie gras was when we lived in the Périgord. The goose liver that I had purchased at the market in Sarlat, an excellent source for black truffles and goose and duck livers, was one of the best that I’ve ever tasted.
The foie should fill the terrine.
There are some equally, well-known foie gras markets in the Gers département, just to the west of where we live, but I decided that this time I would buy the liver directly from a producer. My wife works with the wife of a local farmer who sells the meat and livers from 180 ducks each December, right before Christmas. I picked up my 500-gram (a little over one pound) duck liver, and was also given some cooking tips from the mother-in-law of my wife’s colleague.
Despite its luxury food aura, foie gras is ridiculously easy to make. After rinsing it, you remove any large veins and discoloration. It’s then salted (I used just less than one teaspoon; this is based on 12 grams of salt per kilo of foie gras) and lightly peppered (the recipe called for 3 grams of pepper per kilo, so I used around half a teaspoon). After placing the liver in my terrine, I splashed half a glass of Armagnac on top of it.
Terrine with dough seal, placed in the bain-marie.
While I was heating a casserole dish, partially filled with water, in my oven, I prepared some dough out of flour and water. I rolled out this dough into a long cord, which I then used to seal the lid of the terrine to the base. This dough seal was a suggestion from the mother-in-law of my wife’s colleague. “When the dough is cooked,” she told me, “the foie gras is cooked as well.” In the case of my 500-gram liver, that was 30 minutes in a 170° C (338° F) oven. The foie gras, still in the terrine, is at the bottom of our refrigerator, where it can stay for up to eight days before being eaten.
Cooked foie gras with rendered fat.
I’ll have some tasting notes when we eat this mi-cuit (semi-cooked) foie gras at Christmas, along with some thoughts about wines to accompany foie gras.
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I loved reading about how to make foie gras and how you received the recipe. Everyday life in a lifestyle different from what we experience in our routine hometown USA. I find articles such as yours fascinating.
Our “foie gras,” eaten on “pain seigle” (rye bread) on Christmas eve, was delicious. I chose a 2005 Sauternes (Château du Grand Carretey) to accompany it, hesitating over a Pacherenc du Vic-Bilh, a sweet white wine made in the shadows of the Pyrenees, and a 1997 Monbazillac, also from the southwest of France. The next time, I think that I’ll cook the “foie gras” for the same amount of time–30 minutes, but I’ll reduce the oven temperature by 10° C. To my taste, it was a little overcooked. We’ll see in January, as that’s when “foie” are next available.