When I took a buck this year, I kept the liver, rather than leaving it in the gut pile for the coyotes. My family's not big on organ meats, but I had seen some recipes that called for deer liver and I wanted to try it.

Here's the basic recipe I followed yesterday to make venison liver pate:

1 lb deer liver, (I used the large lobe) diced
8 oz butter cut up in small chunks
1/2 c minced onion
2 eggs, hard boiled and chopped
1 clove garlic, crushed
4 T mayonnaise
2 T bacon fat
2 t Frank's hot sauce

Saute the liver in the bacon fat until it's browned outside, but still reddish on the inside. Remove to a large bowl using a slotted spoon. Using a spatula, blend the liver and all the ingredients as well as you can. Scoop the mixture into a food processor (you might have to do more than one batch). Blend until smooth.

I had to pick out a few chunks that my food processor refused to chop up.

As you can see from the ingredients, this dish is not cardiologist-approved. But spread on crackers, it is quite tasty, much like liverwurst. The first batch I made, I left out the hot sauce. I found the resulting product to be too bland. The hot sauce doesn't make the pate spicy, it just gives it a little more flavor, so don't leave it out.

Any ideas for improvement? This liver was in the freezer for about 8 weeks. I think using the liver fresh from the kill might be good.

Anyway, I really felt like this was the ultimate in cooking from scratch.

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Note: This story was taken from Mark's blog, comments for the recipe may be made there. Mark would also like to note that he is not the creator of this recipe, rather he found it circulating in several hunting forums without attribution.
-Andy