Liver. You know its good for you. Traditional cookbooks include recipes for liver patés that are filled with tantalizing descriptions like "elegant," "luxurious" and "velvety smooth." Blogs are cluttered with artsy pictures of browned liver and shimmering onions dished out onto colorful platters. Liver, once shunned and forgotten, is now being praised in health communities for its powerful protein content and unique blend of vitamins. But when it comes right down to it- that smell, that taste, that texture- well, put nicely, liver is just not for everyone. So, for all the offal-afraid out there, here is a sneaky burger recipe that uses a secret dash of desiccated liver, to make an easy, healthy and surprisingly normal-tasting meal.
Just because you have a lingering distaste for liver, doesn't mean that you are a miserable failure at traditional cooking. There seems to be a tendancy in some ancestral health circles to shamefully hide aversions to liver, as though a dislike of this superstar food somehow reveals you as an impostor real foodie. There is also a more common propensity for people to be so utterly disgusted by the liver, that they disregard the food completely- speeding by trays of it in the grocery store or glazing over articles about its health benefits like they don't even exist. In either situation, liver is ignored and it's simply not fair.
If you don't like liver or are nervous about trying it, that is fully acceptable. But even still, there are ways to get liver into the diet and be happy too! Imagine that? All it takes is getting a bit more creative about fitting this superfood into your diet.
Benefits of Eating Liver
You can read more in-depth about the health benefits of liver here, but as a brief refresher and source of inspiration, below you will find a quick list of all the positive qualities this rich food has to offer:
- An excellent source of high-quality protein
- Contains all of the fat soluble vitamins A, D, E and K
- Nature's most concentrated source of vitamin A, which is rapidly depleted during periods of stress, as well as by consuming a low-fat diet
- All the B vitamins in abundance, particularly vitamin B12
- One of our best sources of natural folate
- A highly usable form of iron
- Trace elements such as copper, zinc and chromium; liver is our best source of copper
- CoQ10, a nutrient that is especially important for cardio-vascular function
- A good source of purines, nitrogen-containing compounds that serve as precursors for DNA and RNA
The Secret Ingredient: Desiccated Liver
Dried liver powder offers the ideal route to get beef liver into the diet for those that can't tolerate the real stuff. Radiant Life desiccated liver comes from grass fed cows and is absolutely free of stabilizers, preservatives or other funky additives. Thus it is really the same as the raw organ meat itself- just without the water. As a convenient powder, it can be easily sneaked into meat dishes, soups, chilis and stews. Some of the braver folks out there even mix it with a splash of juice and drink it right down. This burger recipe is just one example of the many ways it can be used in the kitchen.
The recommendation for liver intake according to the Weston A Price Foundation is 4 oz or so per week. You can experiment with adding more or less based on taste and personal nutrition requirements.
Secret Liver Burgers
This recipe is that it is customizable to the maximum. I give you one possible variation below, but there are countless others. Mix and match spices, use different types of meat, form into large patties or small- whatever you do just be sure to get that liver in!
Ingredients
The Basics
1 lb grass fed beef
1-2 tbsps Desiccated Liver
Add-ins
1/4 cup onion, finely chopped
1-2 cloves garlic, minced
1 1/2 tsps dried sage
1 1/2 tsps dried thyme
In large bowl mix together desiccated liver and ground meat. Add onions, garlic and favorite spices. Divide into desired portions and shape into patties. Add about 1 tablespoon ghee, coconut oil or (my new favorite) coconut ghee into a large skillet over medium heat. Add burgers and cook until desired doneness, flipping to cook evenly on both sides.
