Enjoying Liver

As you will see from the initial menus, calves’ or lambs’ liver is an essential part of the diet and should be eaten regularly. It should be a most enjoyable meat, full of flavour, moist and tender. Here are a few tips to ensure that you achieve this.

If you find the flavour slightly too strong for your taste marinate the slices for one person in 3–4 tablespoons of milk before cooking. Leave for 30 minutes, then remove the liver and dry it well on paper towels. The milk, which reduces the strong taste, can be heated with seasoning and chopped herbs, thickened with cornflour and served as a sauce. Note: this step is not suitable for kosher diets.

Never overcook liver. This does not make it more tender; on the contrary it makes it hard and dry. It cooks extremely quickly, so I never do it in the microwave. Neither do I flour it before cooking. I find this tends to harden the outside; and of course while following the diet you should omit a flour coating in any form of cooking.

If you are serving other ingredients, such as onions, as an accompaniment to liver, cook them first and keep them warm, then cook the liver. Never keep liver waiting on the hot pan, as it will continue to cook; serve it immediately.

As you will see from the following recipes there are many ingredients that blend well with liver. Do try them, for they make a pleasant change. The liver recipes covering the first 14 days of the diet are very simple, as they use just the recommended ingredients. After you have discovered which foods do, and do not, affect your arthritis you can become more adventurous.