Chicken liver pâté with sour cherry chutney

I absolutely adore chicken liver pâté and you certainly can not compare home made stuff to the store-bought one. Besides those have hardly seen any liver, not to mention the list of the rest of the ingredients. It is really difficult to find free range chicken liver in my area and when I manage to find it I always try to make the most out of it. I am a huge fan of chicken liver with freshly baked bread and an onion-tomato salad, of course only when tomatoes are in season. I am so looking forward to end of summer, the best time of the year to eat tomatoes. Anyway, back the the pâté that this time I served with a spicy sour cherry chutney.

Ingredients:
for the chicken liver pâté:
150 g chicken liver
50 g butter + 1/4 teaspoon
1 shallot
3 tablespoons madeira
3-4 sage leaves or as desired + a few more for the top
1/8 teaspoon ground ginger
chicken lard for frying the liver
2 tablespoons ghee
salt
freshly ground pepper

for the sour cherry chutney:
150 g pitted sour cherries (mine from the freezer)
1 red onion
30 g dried sour cherries
1 cinnamon stick
2-3 green cardamom pods
2-3 cloves
2-3 allspice berries
4-5 black peppercorns
3 tablespoons brown sugar
4 tablespoons port wine

Melt chicken lard (best if you get it fresh right out of a free range chicken) over low heat and fry chicken liver, then set aside. In another saucepan melt butter and sautee onion until it is caramelised, add madeira and reduce by half. Puree liver with the madeira-onion liquid, add butter and sage and puree again. Mash it through a fine sieve, season with salt and freshy ground pepper and pour into a small ramequin and put a few sage leaves on top. Melt ghee and let it cool slightly and pour it on top of the pâté. Chill for at least 3 hours.

For the chutney chop onion and bring it to the boil with the rest of the ingredients. Then reduce heat and cook over medium heat for 30-40 minutes, then remove the spices and fill into a jar and chill.