Week 4 - Offal

I think I let out an audible groan when I saw the Week 4 theme was offal. I don't completely avoid offal, although it's not really my thing. I like lengua tacos and liverwurst and sometimes blood sausage and pâté. But, for the most part, I have zero desire to cook any offal in our kitchen. (The morcilla for the cigrons and liverwurst sandwiches are the only exceptions I can think of at the moment.) 

A eats everything and quite likes offal. We went for lunch at a Colombian restaurant last year and he was so excited as he kept finding more and more chicken hearts in the soup. He loves tripe and all the things I won't really touch at dim sum. I knew he would probably eat any offal I chose to make, but I didn't want to gross myself out too much during the challenge, so I played it safe and went with liverwurst (actually, Braunschweiger, which adds bacon to the pork liver-based liverwurst). No point in making something for the challenge that I don't actually want to eat, since then I'd have to make a second dinner for myself.

I decided to go with liverwurst and provolone grilled sandwiches. Whenever we get liverwurst, it's usually in sandwich form mixed with provolone, but this was the first time I've made it like a grilled cheese. For sandwiches for 2, I used:

- 4 slices of white bread (free - they were "hand-me-downs" from my parents)

- 2 tbsp of softened butter ($0.50)

- a few small spoonfuls of whole grain dijon mustard ($0.21)

- thinly sliced red onion ($0.20)

- 4 slices of provolone cheese ($1.60)

- 4 slices of Braunschweiger / liverwurst ($1.75)

Although I wrote 4 slices for the recipe, the cost I'm counting for each is 5 since while prepping, we split a slice of each. The total for the sandwiches was about $4.26, and that's without the cost of bread and also not packing the sandwiches with as much meat and cheese as we would have if we didn't have a side dish. I don't know why people always talk about college students or people on a budget eating sandwiches. Cold cuts and sandwich meats and cheese are expensive! It's so much cheaper eating lentils and beans and that type of stuff, not to mention healthier, especially in the sodium department.

The sandwiches were relatively simple to put together. First, butter the bread like you would for any grilled cheese, making sure to butter all the way to the edges. Then flip the slices over and spread the whole grain mustard on the opposite side of each slice. Add the red onions.

Next add the provolone and then the liverwurst. I suppose I could have just put the full slices of cheese on without tearing them up, but I was trying to make the sandwiches neat so that the cheese would extend just to the end of the bread. They always slide when flipping anyway, so I'm not sure why I bother!

Cook the sandwiches just like any other grilled cheese sandwich. Place in a heated (but not oiled) nonstick pan. Cook for a few minutes and flip (based on desired amount of browning).

The sandwich was pretty good, but not amazing. I think I like the liverwurst from the deli counter better than the packaged Braunschweiger stuff, but the deli counter at our closest grocery store is pretty tiny and sad, and I wasn't even sure they carried it. It was pretty salty (as we expected it would be), so I wanted to make sure we had a side that could balance out both the richness and saltiness. My original plan was a fresh arugula and tomato salad, but that fell through. I don't know what's going on with the arugula distributor in our region for Trader Joe's, but there hasn't been arugula in weeks. I decided to go with plan B and roast some brussels sprouts.

This bag of frozen "true Belgian Brussels sprouts" was another hand-me-down from my parents (so I won't price this part out since I don't even know how much it cost). I thawed them a little bit in the fridge and then dumped them into a greased baking dish with chopped red onion (the remainder of the onion after cutting the slivers for the sandwiches), olive oil, salt, and ground black pepper. Tossed it all around a bit and then stuck it in a 400 degree oven.

The package said to roast them for 20-25 minutes, or until they were starting to brown, but that didn't sound like enough to me. After 20 minutes, I stirred them. They were fine then but not brown, and I prefer Brussels sprouts and onions to caramelize when I roast them. They get so soft and sweet. I stirred it a couple more times after that, but I think I let it go for at least another 20 minutes. I wasn't paying that much attention to the time, but pretty much just left them in the oven until I was done with the grilled sandwiches. If I had to estimate though, I'd say the total roasting time was probably close to 40-45 minutes.

Once I pulled the dish out of the oven, I drizzled on some balsamic vinegar and mixed it all together some more. The vegetables were so nice and sweet, helped along by the finishing of balsamic, and worked well with the salty sandwich, helping to balance it out quite a bit. The Brussels sprouts themselves were like mini sprouts, much smaller than the ones I normally see in the Costco bags. I like the small bite-size nature of these sprouts, and would definitely consider buying this on another visit. Really easy to keep in the freezer and then use on any night that we don't really have a plan, but want something healthy and nutritious.

Overall, we had a good dinner, even if it didn't feel all that "challenging" since liverwurst is an ingredient I know and have eaten before, and in the same (sandwich) form that we had it this time. But it fits the offal challenge and was within the limits of what I wanted to buy and cook and eat. The next challenge is going to be hard enough to figure out what to do, so I was glad to have the break from pondering recipe choices!