Laura the Gastronaut > Julia Child > Cold Buffet > Chicken Livers in Aspic

Chicken Livers in Aspic

April 26, 2021 | Updated August 24, 2023 | Laura

✽ Recipe from Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Vol. I | Julia Child ✽

Julia Child Recipe 174 | 354 recipes to go!

✽ Chicken Livers in Aspic [Foies de Volaille en Aspic], p. 548

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✽ Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Vol. I was written by Julia Child who co-authored with Simone Beck & Louisette Bertholle and was published by Alfred A. Knopf in 1961.

✽ You can buy Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Volume I which contains these recipes here. (affiliate link)

The purpose of this Julia Child section of my blog is to document my journey of learning how to cook. To show my successes, my failures, and what I learned along the way.

Since I didn't create these recipes (if only!), I do not post exact amounts of ingredients or word-for-word instructions. If any of these recipes spark your interest, I highly recommend you buy Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking (affiliate link). It's a great investment and learning tool and contains hundreds of classic recipes.

I hope that you enjoy reading my thoughts, learn something new, and leave inspired to try a new recipe. Bon appétit!

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✽ Butter Count: +2 TB

✽ Cost: $5.91 [~$0.99 per serving]

Check out the total Julia Child butter count & cost here!

→ Looking for a different Julia Child recipe? Here's a list of all of the completed and pending Mastering the Art of French Cooking recipes!

Wow. Where do I even begin with this one?

Could this aspic be even worse than the previous, poached eggs in aspic?? I'm curious if anybody has actually ever set out to make this recipe with intentions to eat it. It's so bizarre to me.

Cold chicken livers stuck in the middle of meat jelly. I never want to see this dish sitting on my dining room table again. NEVER.

✽ Laura's Rating: 2

✽ Brian's Rating: 2

After that introduction, you may be wondering how this recipe received a rating of 2. Let me explain. The chicken livers cooked in butter with shallots and port wine are actually good. I'm not the biggest liver fan, but I can eat it and understand why some people enjoy it.

For that reason alone, this recipe earned a 2 out of 10 rating. The taste is there, but everything else is trash (sorry, Julia...). First, the cold liver. Bleh, it still makes me shiver thinking about it. Just the whole cold liver with the thick cold wine sauce covering it was enough to do me in.

Let's not stop there though. Let's put that cold liver in the middle of some beef stock jelly. The coldness of it all, the wiggliness, the smells.. makes me wonder why this is a thing. Also, some aspics are pretty. This is not one of the pretty ones. It's ugly, and it doesn't even try to hide that fact that it's ugly. It's proud of it. It's thrilled to know that you will have nightmares about it after this is all said and done.

Looking for more Julia Child aspic recipes to read about?

→ Check out all of the cold buffet recipes that I've completed so far!

✽ Step 1: Set Gelatin

I had planned on trying to make my own gelatinous stock with the calf's feet again, but I forgot to pick up some pork rind so I'll have to have that fun adventure with my next aspic.

For this one, I simply put unflavored gelatin powder on some beef stock I previously made. A small amount is poured into each of the ramekins and put in the fridge to set.

✽ Step 2: Cook Livers & Shallots

The livers are cooked in a butter oil mixture for 2 minutes to allow them to brown lightly. The shallot is thrown in for 5 seconds, and the fat is drained out.

✽ Step 3: Add Seasonings & Wine

Salt, pepper, and allspice are sprinkled on the livers and port wine is poured it. This all simmers slowly for a few minutes. After, the livers are removed from the pan, and the wine is boiled down until syrupy. The livers then have to be chilled so they are ready to be put in the meat Jell-O!

✽ Step 4: Add Seasonings & Wine

Once the livers are nice and cold, they are put into the ramekins and covered in the almost-set meat jelly. Now it's just time to wait until they are set!

Julia suggests to serve on a lettuce leaf so I did just that. Honestly, the lettuce helped the aspic go down as the crunch was nice to offset the wiggly Jell-O.

*This blog, Laura The Gastronaut, and this post were/are not endorsed or supported by Julia Child or The Julia Child Foundation.

Category: Julia Child, Cold Buffet Cuisine: French
Keywords: julia child aspic recipe, french aspic recipes, homemade aspic recipe

✽ Did you make this recipe too?
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More Cold Buffet Recipes:

✽ Poached Eggs in Aspic (poached eggs suspended inside of meat stock jelly)
✽ Cold Beef and Potato Salad (a delicious option for a light lunch)
✽ Salade Nicoise (a classic salad that has many different components)
→ Check out all of the completed Julia Child cold buffet recipes!

✽ You can find this recipe and all the other Julia Child recipes I make in Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Volume I (affiliate link). Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Vol. I was written by Julia Child who co-authored with Simone Beck & Louisette Bertholle and was published by Alfred A. Knopf in 1961.

✽ Check out my Julia Child Recipe Checklist to see a list of all my completed and pending recipes from Mastering the Art of French Cooking!

Bon appétit!

April 26, 2021 by Laura Ehlers

*This Chicken Livers in Aspic blog post may contain Amazon affiliate links. These link to products that I personally use and recommend. If you purchase anything using my links, it will not cost you anything. It will though give laurathegastronaut.com some financial support which helps me keep this blog running. Thank you for reading my blogs and your continued support.