Lamb Liver and Leeks

Phil is sick, and I'm (hopefully) fighting something off, so I thought liver would be good for tonight and to balance it a crisp salad of leeks and small tomatoes. Found out Lane is also having leeks tonight, and will be interesting to see what he does with his. But the main dish of the day was liver, this the liver from the lamb I got Tuesday afternoon. Picture above shows the whole of the lamb liver after I've sectioned/sliced it.

The recipes I have call for you to slice liver 1/4" thick, but that seems far too thin to me, and the smallest slices I made were more on the order of 1/2". I'm still new to this crosswise slicing of slimy things endeavor, so my slices tend to be thick in any event because I don't want to lose fingers in the process.

I cooked all of the liver and used a little less than half for dinner; the rest I'll make chopped liver with for tomorrow. Instructions for liver: Preheat griddle on medium heat. Melt approx 2T lard on griddle. When lard is melted and griddle is hot, add thick-ish liver slices and saute 4 min total, flipping to be sure both sides are nicely seared. Remove liver and plate. Melt 1-2T ghee on the griddle. Add a couple of mushrooms, sliced fairly thin. Saute until just starting to get transparent, and add 1/4 c cranberry liqueur or port. Continue sauteing, scraping up bits strenuously, until the liquid is reduced to a medium-thick sauce. Pour mushrooms and sauce over liver. Picture below shows it done and plated. The thin sauce to the right of the liver and musrooms is sauce and a bit of blood, becuase the liver should still be fairly rare in the middle when you pull it off the griddle.
Served here with leek salad. Instructions: Thinly slice a leek (green and light green parts; save the rest for scrap salad) into a bowl. Halve 8 - 10 pearl/cherry/grape tomatoes and add. Halve 4 -6 Japanese pickled onions (rakkyo; they are sweet, not like cocktail onions) and add. Mix 2T lime juice, 1T olive oil, and 1T hot prepared mustard (I used Colmans) and add. Let marinate at least a half hour.

Eating Notes: We don't like liver as much as Kitchen Goddes Nadja (see below with laser eyes) but we sure like it a lot. The mineral notes of the liver are well-balanced by the cranberry liqueur and the whole thing set off well by the salad.