Leberwurst
Spreadable liver sausage, classed among the wursts in German nomenclature. French tradition would place it rather among the pâtés. The expression Beleidigte Leberwurst spielen (to play the offended liver sausage) designates, in everyday German, someone who sulks.
| Fresh pork liver | 300 g |
| Pork jowl | 400 g |
| Fresh fatback | 200 g |
| Onion, sliced and cooked in lard | 100 g |
| Fine salt | 15 g |
| Ground white pepper | 2 g |
| Dried marjoram | 3 g |
| Ground allspice | 1 g |
| Grated nutmeg | 1 g |
| Dried thyme | 1 g |
| Meat stock | 80 ml |
| Wide hog casing (Ø 60–80 mm) or jar | — |
- Preliminary cooking: Poach the jowl and the fatback in salted water for 30 minutes. Poach the liver separately for 10 minutes. Reserve the stocks. Cool slightly.
- Preparing the onions: Slice the onions finely and melt them in lard over very gentle heat until fully translucent. Cool.
- Mincing: Mince all the meats while still warm through the fine 3 mm plate, or process in a bowl cutter for an even smoother texture.
- Emulsion: Add the onions, the spices and the hot stock. Process until a perfectly smooth, creamy paste is obtained.
- Stuffing: Stuff into the wide casings, or pour into sterilised jars.
- Final cooking: Poach the casings for 45 to 60 minutes at 75–80 °C, or sterilise the jars for 90 minutes at 100 °C.
- Cooling: Cool rapidly. Refrigerate for at least 12 hours before eating.
- Serving: Spread on rye bread (Roggenbrot) with gherkins and mustard.
The leberwurst occupies an atypical categorical position: stuffed into a casing, it has the form of a sausage; fully cooked and emulsified, it has the texture of a pâté. German nomenclature classifies it unambiguously among the wursts, the term designating any cased preparation.
Similar recipes appear in Germanic culinary manuscripts from the fourteenth century, built around one and the same logic: making the most of the liver, a highly perishable organ, by transforming it immediately after slaughter into a cooked, keepable preparation. Marjoram, allspice and thyme constitute the traditional seasoning, attested from the earliest sources. The liver is poached only briefly before emulsion: overcooking would make it grainy and compromise the final smoothness. The hot stock, worked into the forcemeat, aids the emulsion and contributes to a spreadable consistency.
The regional variants are numerous. The Thuringian version is fine and mild; the Berlin version is coarser and more spiced; the zwiebelleberwurst with melting onion is the most widespread in northern Germany; the kalbsleberwurst with calf’s liver is paler and more delicate. The grobe leberwurst version keeps visible pieces of liver and fatback.
It is spread on rye bread and served with gherkins and mustard at any hour of the day. Post-war German nutritional recommendations mention it as a food suited to young children, thanks to its spreadable texture and mildness, which make it one of the first charcuteries introduced into infant diets. The leberwurst remains the best-selling spreadable charcuterie in Germany.
The expression Beleidigte Leberwurst spielen, literally ‘to play the offended liver sausage’, designates in everyday German someone who pouts or threatens to withdraw. In the Berlin dialect, it is said to have gained renewed currency in the 1930s, when Hitler, according to several secondary sources, used it in reply to a threatened resignation by Göring. The anecdote is reported without an identifiable primary source, but the expression itself is well attested and still in common use.
The book
All 144 recipes and their histories, gathered in a single volume.