Duck liver toast with bitter leaves and blackberries

I never tire of cooking with liver, a relatively cheap ingredient at the butcher’s, full of goodness and reasonably versatile if you love it as much as I do.

One indulgent method for an easy solo dinner is to sauté a few thin slices of onion in plenty of butter and add a few livers. A quick sauté before putting them onto toast – it is something I am not ashamed to say I love to eat alone.

The only other offal-y dish I cook like this is calf’s liver, sans toast, to enjoy alongside a glass of chianti.

I like salad, especially when it is the main meal. I am always trying to build a salad and incorporate a protein of sorts to call it dinner. Leftover roast chicken with a few cornichons and a handful of cos leaves can often be better than the roast chicken the night before.

Loading up a salad with unconventional indulgence, pretending that the salad I am eating is healthy, perhaps helps me sleep better at night. I’m not really sure.

This version of pâté is pretty easy to make in small quantity – you could halve this recipe if serving one or two people. While I love a perfectly set, silken parfait, I am equally satisfied by the more rustic texture here. As you would a traditional pâté, I look to sweet and savoury to offset the other elements. In this instance, I use blackberries, malted onions and cornichons.

I also add a mix of bitter leaves, making it technically a salad and certainly taking it into the realms of a legitimate lunch rather than the more predicate “befores” territory.

I’ve included the Italian bitter leaf agretti, which provides a lovely crisp bite. However, you can use more readily available rocket in its place.

If you do manage to get hold of some agretti, you can cook it as you would spinach – simply and quickly in some olive oil with garlic and a squeeze of lemon.