Country Pâté (Pâté de Campagne)

"Pâté" is simply the modern French word for "paste," and the old form of the French word was also spelled "paste." The word provided the basis for a dish of chopped or ground seasoned meat. Some pâté is spreadable, and other pâté is firmer and better suited for slicing, as in this recipe here, but whatever the texture, pâté is not a fat free food. When you get right down to it, this is actually a kind of meatloaf. It is "typically" served with some Dijon mustard, bread (sometimes toasted) and cornichons (small pickles). 

Ingredients:

1 onion, finely chopped
4 cloves garlic, chopped
2 pounds ground pork
1/2 pound slab bacon, chopped
1/2 pound pork liver, coarsely chopped (or chicken livers)
1/2 pound smoked ham, coarsely chopped
1/2 cup Cognac
2 tablespoons butter
1 pound sliced bacon
1 tablespoon salt
1 teaspoon white pepper
1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1 teaspoon ground cloves
1 teaspoon ground mace
2 teaspoons dried thyme
2 eggs
1/2 cup heavy cream 
1/2 cup bread crumbs (I used panko)

Melt the butter in a skillet over low heat. Add the onion and cook until softened; let cool. Mix together the ground pork, the chopped slab bacon, the chopped pork liver, the chopped ham, garlic, softened onion, white pepper, salt, cayenne pepper, cloves, mace, thyme, Cognac, eggs, cream and bread crumbs. Mix very well. Cover and refrigerate for about 12 hours.

Line a loaf pan or terrine with parchment paper or foil, then line the dish with bacon strips, leaving any length of bacon slices to be folded over the top, once the meat is smoothed out in the pan/dish. Leave up to an inch of space between the top of the meat and the top of the pan.* Cover and top the meat with the folded over bacon and finish covering the top with lengthwise slices of bacon. Cover the pan/dish with a lid (if using a terrine) or foil. Put the loaf pan or terrine into a somewhat larger pan and add warm or hot water about 2/3 of the way up the loaf pan. If you are using a metal or heavy crock ware loaf pan or terrine, you can use hot tap water, but I used a glass loaf type dish, so I used just "warm" tap water, as hot water could crack the dish filled with the cold mixture. Put this all into a 350 F oven and let bake for 2 hours. Let the pâté cool, then place the loaf pan/terrine into the refrigerator for at least 12 hours.** Because I had the glass dish, I put a couple inches of warm water into the sink and I let the dish sit in the barely warm water for about 3 minutes, just to loosen it. You want the pâté to remain cold, not only for serving, but if it warms up, you will have fat running everywhere. You should be able to grasp the parchment paper or foil to make sure the pâté is loosened. Turn it out onto a plate/platter, cover with plastic wrap or foil and put it back into the refrigerator for about 20 to 30 minutes. Slice and enjoy. 

* I had just a little of the mixture left over and I just fixed it separately. 

** Some put a piece of foil or plastic wrapped cardboard over the top of the pâté and then they put canned food or other such things on the cardboard to act as a weight to compress the pâté while it is refrigerated. This step does help to firm the pâté even more, but it's up to you, as it isn't totally necessary.          


After the wrapping was removed, I returned the meat to the loaf dish for this photo. Say "Cheese!"

Served with some Dijon mustard, slices of baguette and some cornichons (small pickles)

WORD HISTORY:
Grind-This word has a somewhat difficult history, but it is distantly related to Latin "frendere," which meant, "to rub, to gnash the teeth." It is related to "ground," the noun meaning, "the Earth's surface, the soil making up the Earth's surface." It goes back to Indo European "ghrendh," which had the notion, "to rub, to rub together to break a substance down," with the extended meaning, "to crush." This gave Old Germanic "grindanan," with the same meaning. This then gave Old English (Anglo-Saxon) "grindan" (as well as a couple of compounds) meaning "to crush, to mill." This then became "grinden," before the modern form. The noun form was derived from the verb (circa 1000?), originally with the meaning, "a grinding or gnashing with the teeth." Until more recent times, if water power was not available, grinding grain required animal or human power to move the stones to crush the grain. This likely gave rise to the expression "the grind;" that is, "hard and boring work." Many of the modern Germanic languages use forms of "mill" and "to mill" for their words related to "grinding grain," but Dutch has the noun "grind" for "grit;" thus also, "gravel." I found a form in West Frisian, but whether this is a borrowing from Dutch or English, or an original form, is unclear. Swedish has "grand," meaning, "particle, dust particle, atom." German once had "grint," a noun meaning "skin ailment of flaky skin," which later progressed to mean, "crusty sore or wound," and also, "skin ailment of the scalp, ringworm (Kopfgrind)." Low German once had "grint," meaning "sand, grit," and Old Norse had "grand," meaning, "particles, grains, grit, pebbles," which also might have been borrowed by Low German as "Grand," but meaning "wheat bran." As can be seen, all forms tie in with "small items, particles of something."