hi everybody I'm Kimberly Edwards with cooking with Kimberly calm and tonight I'm going to show you how to make one of the most popular recipes on my website I don't understand it because I don't really like eating it but other people are crazy about it and that's what's going on so what I'm making you tonight is down south smothered liver and onions and hmm maybe I don't like it because when I was young my parents used to tell me that liver when my mom used to serve liver she would tell me it was beaver tail and they thought it was like a big joke and it totally like freaked me out completely freaked me out and I never never really wanted to eat it now I know it's not but still it is the smell it's the whole idea of it just not cool don't tell your kids that's beaver tail you'll scare them they want to eat it anyways so here we are this is a different way than my mom used to prepare it this is a southern way and I quite like it a lot better I tried little bits and pieces of it just to make sure that it tastes right and it's okay it's just I can't get over at my brain so it's just me all right so what we have right now is my recipe on the site says for liver steaks but I'm doing half of half a batch because I'm only cooking it for my mom so I have a batch for two steaks going on this is calf's liver it's the only kind she'll eat they have all kinds of livers they have chicken livers and turkey livers and pork livers and beef livers and whatever whatever anyway this is beef liver from a calf okay so that's the only kind she really really likes and I need to wipe my hands okay so in this plate next to it I have a about 3/4 of a cup of flour okay double the recipe up if you're doing four steaks so I'm just going to season the flour a little bit with some pepper mostly what I'm going to season it are these steaks okay I want them to taste very flavorful I'm not going to put any salt on them right now because the rest of my seasonings on the outside are going to do that but I don't want to leach any excess liquid from the lip liver that's going to if I use salt that's what will happen so I'm just going to sprinkle with some pepper okay a little bit of garlic powder onion powder if you like it or have it you can do that too I'm doing a little bit of cayenne pepper just a little tiny tiny just gonna say quad kick and a little bit of paprika okay beautiful and then I'm gonna flip them over and I'm gonna do the exact same thing on the other side I'd rather season right on the steak instead of all through the flour because most of the flour ends up getting thrown out anyway and it doesn't get used so half of your seasonings are in there and for no for no reason right let's proxy pepperoni okay these liver steaks also they have been washed under cold cold water and patted dry very gently liver is very um fried seems very delicate very fragile so you have to be very careful when you're when you're handling it because it'll just poke holes in it'll fall apart and then you'll have little tiny pieces of liver okay so here's my dredging flour and here's just a plain old plate to put my my liver steaks on here we go beautiful make sure it's completely coated okay you probably don't even need this much flour but you're going to use a little bit of this flour later for the rest of the recipe so reserve it to the side okay so I just make sure it's nice and coated on all sides and then I do a little shake off okay to make sure you don't have all kinds of extra stuff that you don't need and in goes the other steak do the best you can to coat it all up nicely Kotova coat it up nicely now on my stove on medium low heat I've had a large frying pan getting preheated and it has about two tablespoons of olive oil in it now you can use canola oil use what you have at home canola oil you can use safflower oil sunflower oil canola oil whatever I just have olive oil and that's what I'm using tonight and there goes my other steak see how gentle you have to be with them okay so this is going to go over here my flour and this goes in the sink hold on wash my hand now I don't know if you guys are proud liver I think liver is kind of I don't know it seems to be a recipe of the past not a lot of people in my liver these days but I think we're going to make a comeback liver is very high in iron and very helpful for a lot of different things in your health to get protein and whatever okay so I'm going to take you over to my stovetop I believe yeah I'm gonna take you there now here goes my liver and here you come with me hope you guys are well today alright here are two frying pans one frying pan has 1/2 olive oil and 1/2 butter that's going to fry up my onions and this large frying pan this is for my liver so you move you turn it close there we go see little better okay in go into my pan is gonna go the liver now I have all I have olive oil in here it's dancing around it's ready to go and I'm just going to test the temperature I have a little bit of water if you flick it in there and it sizzles you're ready to go okay in goes your liver steaks it doesn't take long to cook liver at all you want a nice golden-brown crust from your flour on both sides and then you're going to take the liver out of the pan and you're going to reserve it to the side okay well that is going I'm going to cover it up with one of these handy to anything this is a screen that goes on top of your frying pans they keep you from getting splattered with the grease it's awesome you need to buy one I don't know where you buy them but there you go maybe I'll find the link for you guys on the bottom of the site ok so that's going to take a couple of minutes and I have that on medium low heat okay actually it's kind of right now and into my other pan I have usually I would just slice onions I like when I make the liver and onions I like the slices the long skinny pieces but I already diced a whole big onion for something else the other day and I'm going to use the diced onions and that's okay because we're smothering it and it's just going to go into the gravy etc and it'll be okay sorry I keep adjusting this so into my nice warm pan again this is on medium heat and half of it's butter half of it is olive oil so we're going to sizzle these onions up this might take a little while guys sorry you're witnessing dinner okay so stir these around I'm going to space in my onions my onions need to be seasoned with salt and pepper at least so here's some soil yes I like to grind my salt it makes it nice and fresh just like you do your pepper okay in goes the pepper there's nothing like sauteing onions with butter now you can use olive oil you can use whatever other kind of oil you want but a little bit of butter just for that nice sugar you'll be happy you did okay if you can hear my liver going that's great sizzle now it should only take probably three minutes a side dish I would say I'm guesstimating and I'm gonna let these go low and slow these onions go low and slow because you want them nice and caramelized that means you don't want them white you don't let them yellowy you don't want them burnt you want them golden brown and thermally beautiful okay so they take a little while you want to do those on the little low ish heat if you go too fast with onions they'll surely burn okay that's definitely not what you want again I'm using about half of the ingredients as the full recipe I have on the website okay we just check this beautiful now these are fast varietal so I'll probably say that on the package that you buy for your liver later on might see they'll probably stay down on the package that you buy it's fast right again it takes like literally under five minutes problems to cook it but I'm doing the rest of the stuff to make it smothered and gravy and the whole nine so that's why this recipe is taking a little bit longer so we're still going with our onions onions onions okay I'm going to flip this over at this point it look nice see how that looks it's nice and golden brown flip it over the side same thing okay so no else to tell you guys for a minute why don't you I let you guys sit tight I'm going to skip you forward a little bit with my recipe and you'll see time elapsed in the hots I can top off that the onions should be nice and done and caramel and beautiful and the liver will be setting aside and then I'll catch up from there okay my onions they are on their way to being there probably translucent I would say they're on their way there hold on let me move this that's a awesome okay so these guys are translucent and they have to keep going so I would say they're probably halfway through they're cooking okay and what I'm going to do is I'm going to add probably about a maybe an eighth of a cup not even tablespoon a big tablespoon of the flour the dredging flour and I'm mixing it in with my onions this is going to help Brown them slightly just like how you do with your liver okay you dredge it so here you go these are coming right out they're beautifully browned and ready to go I'm going to tell you leave this pan you just leave it going so I'm stirring in this flower making sure it's all work through these onions and I'm going to let these onions keep going again still on some somewhat of a low temperature and I want them to brown slowly slowly beautifully all right so that's one now my liver is going to sit here on the side for two seconds okay out of my way I am going to make a roux and what a roux is is it's a thick sauce thickener and the whole point of my brew today is because I'm going to be making a gravy with this like I'm smothering it right so I'm going to put this is from I still have fat in here okay I am oil in here that looks like a whole lot I'm gonna for a little bit out I don't need that much it's already too long all right I have probably a tablespoon and a half of oil okay I'm also going to add a slight little bit of butter to that just because I like the flavor that's a but ah okay fix that light is probably blinding you okay so I still have this dredging flour awesome we're not wasting too much stuff mix that butter is okay I'm going to put equal amount of flour into this root cut into the oil okay and I'm going to mix it all up this is what's thickens your sauces this is what thickens your gravy and this is going to be my gravy base so the trick of doing a root is doing them pretty slow so I have it on low heat you're mixing equal parts your oil or your fat and water okay and what happens is you want to mix it thoroughly so that you have no lumps and you're just going to move it around the pan and darken it to your desired color okay so a blonde room when you make crews they are they range in a variety from like a blonde to a dark chocolate so blonde means it's less cooked and the dark chocolate means that Roo has been going and going and going so this is not going to be a blonde Roux this is going to be like a peanut butter color okay so somewhere in the middle we're going a little bit further now cooking it like this with the fat gets that flowery nasty taste out of the flour okay and it's a this way doing it this way low and slow you have to babysit it okay you have to wash it the whole time allow it to thicken I think I'm going to add a little bit more flour but you don't want to get lumps lumps in a roux or like the biggest taboo it's not cold you're better off going lower and slower making sure that you have in a month now gradually to this once you've achieved the desired color which in this case is a peanut butter color okay once I achieve that desired color I'm going to start adding a liquid to thicken it okay so think of this as a base oh these are brands you know I'm checking all my onions see how you have that little bit of brown inside there now you can see you guess you can't okay so I'm still on low and I'm going to allow these to keep on going because they're looking beautiful okay so my roux is looking good I have some chicken stock sitting here on the side now if you don't have chicken stock you can use beef stock you know what a beef stock don't stress you can use water or you can use tea I usually have a pot of tea going all day long if you need extra liquid you can use that even if it's lukewarm okay this is going going going cook that flour taste out it's a nice color the color here that's about the color we're looking for about peanut butter color tiny bit longer sorry to talk about this Russo home guys but the roux is a very important part this is what makes the smothering so delicious okay don't walk away from your room you'll be surely mad you're gonna burn the bottom of it or you're gonna get off okay I also got all those little tiny bits off the bottom of the frying pan that we're so beautiful crispy when I found out my liver okay so the chip yeah you can also use water you can use tea okay slowly but surely I have my room ready I'm going to add a tiny tiny bit of liquid maybe a tablespoon and a half what you do is you work that into the roux you mix it all throughout it thickening up that paste okay you want to make sure it's evenly distributed the whole way okay before you add any more liquid this keeps you from getting all kinds of crazy a few lumps that you do not want okay so that looks beautiful this what happened after my first batch of liquid now it's a little bit thicker okay but it's all even there's no lumps so in some more now as you keep adding you can add gradually a tiny bit more in a tiny bit more so this time I probably added two and a half tablespoons of liquid and I'm working it in making sure it gets all soaked up before I add any more again now you're just going to keep going I'm guesstimating it's going to be about a cup and a half-ish but again you don't know exactly how much flour you use that day and atmospheric conditions change see how that's thickened up now that's the next step okay still no lumps and in we go maybe three and a half four tablespoons and I'm going to work that into okay let it heat back through now Roos are the basis of all kinds of stuff stews Gumbo's ah like things like alfredo sauce cheese sauce béchamel sauces and gravies as well okay I make a lot I use a lot of brews as I lived down south and Texas and Louisiana they use Rouge for a lot of different things now that's got a little bit more now it's starting to look somewhat like a gravy yes yes beautiful we're just gonna keep going until you get without the dessert just maybe a little bit runny er than what you would want your gravy to look like on your meal okay because I'm going to put everything in here in a hot second you're gonna have your liver back in here you're gonna have your new onions that are all like beautifully caramelized and whatnot thrown in there in a sec - and you're gonna let it go and let everything heat through gravy that's what makes it all smothered and awesome okay so I'm working that in still no lumps and that's a beautiful thing we're going to taste-test shortly and we have some other ingredients to add to this gravy just to make it that extra a little bit awesome more awesome okay and if you see that you put everything in here and then you're smothering everything and you're letting it just go and bubble and boil and be beautiful and you see that you're losing a whole lot of water or your gravies like way too thick add some more again so liquid add some tea some water some stock red wine whatever you got going on so that you can thin that out again okay in goes the rest of that and that looks pretty good actually so it's a good estimate it was about 1 and a half cups 1 and 3/4 cups of liquid and that's looking pretty good now with a roux here's another trick with a roux when you're you are cooking it out and you've added all your liquid and it's going to come you want to bring it to a boil you want to activate that flour now once it hits that simmer that nice oil in the pot in the pan that's the maximum thickening power you're going to get out of that amount of flour that you put in if it's not thick enough you might want to do another and you have to do another little tiny frying pan make some more roux and add it as you go got me and that way you can thicken up a little more because right now you wouldn't be able to just dump a whole bunch more flour in it's not going to cook out and it's going to be lumpy and disgusting okay so that looks beautiful I'm just going to do a quick taste test and of course I don't have before I add some other little things okay that's delicious Wow okay my onions are slow going don't forget about them they're sitting next to other pan give them a nice little swirl make sure they're not burning and they're just browning okay for even longer awesome - okay so now my my gravy this is now a gravy has boiled and it's coming to its full thickening power okay that looks beautiful I'm gonna speed these onions up a tiny bed okay into this is going to be I know it might sound funny but trust me one teaspoon of honey I'm eyeballing it stir that through mix it through beautifully and about a tablespoon of red wine now I'm not the alcohol to kind of dissipate and it will take long mix that in doesn't take a lot just a tiny smidgen alcohol carries flavor when you are cooking with it okay so whether you're adding beer or wine or vodka or whatever it really intensifies flavor if you don't want to drink the alcohol then just allow it to heat up and all the alcohol will dissipate out leaving you with the flavor of the liquor that you used okay so this still looks beautiful Wow which is awesome one more taste test in this gravy and I'm gonna add a little bit more pepper I don't need any more salt because my chicken stock had salt in it already and I don't want to over salt this puppy that's enough you can hear my dogs in the background here okay here's cayenne pepper okay tiny bit more free just for good measure come on onions hurry up darlings okay that's being austere through then you want to do a final taste test okay before you add your meat back oh yeah that's exactly what I want your phone okay stirring my onions one more time and I'm going to put my steaks in and then the onions are going to be foam in here okay back on my liver steaks that have already been browned into the gravy on low heat okay let those get gooey gooey good now flip them over in here make sure they're completely coated nicely okay oh yeah that's how you do some other stuff guys okay my onions are looking good now when you take them from this pan and put them into this frying pan they are not going to brown any more so make sure that they're as brown as you want them to be before you add them to this pan make sure they're cooked make sure they're nice and sweet or whatever you're looking for okay sometimes some people just like less onions that are more close to raw like there are just translucent or like that but I like that caramelized flavor that little bit of sweetness that little bit of kick such an extra nice little profile to the flavor okay these are looking lovely I'm going to show you the pan before I put in you can let them go even longer but they're they're nice and browned up okay now and they go to my frying pan mix them thoroughly make sure those liver steaks are sitting nicely and having a nice bath with everything stir these all in you want that gravy to take on that onion flavor and this is liver and onions mother baby now you can serve this with rice or potatoes or whatever it is you want but I'll guarantee you this my mom's probably just going to eat it like this by itself just liver and onions no side dish this is one of her favorite things she in fact maybe that's why I don't like it she said that when she was pregnant with me she ate all she wanted was liver hemmings she just craved it right mom yeah she said she craved it like crazy when she's I've heard lunch hour she'd have one half liver and onions every lunch hour when she was at work so she said her friend was private at the same time they worked at the same place and they both craved this liver and onions now my gravy this is exactly what I was telling you earlier my gravy is looking a little thick a little too much going on here so I'm going to add a tiny bit of tea I just have it sitting here it's better than water has a little more flavor right right so just stir that in then out that gravy because you're going to let this just heat through that's it you just want these flavors to to marinate now to marry I'm sorry so you can cover this up 5 minutes 10 minutes whatever you feel like on very low heat you don't cook to all heck okay so I'm gonna cover this up what am I going to cover it with I'm not covering it right now because that's it I'm not going to show you the final on a plate I'll show you a picture in the blog post okay so that's pretty much it I'm going to show you one more time in the pen this is what you're looking at here line you up there you go that's how to make liver and onions guys smothered liver and onions now again I like using the big stringy onions I don't like doing them with a little dice but this just happened to be what I had today and that's what we're doing so go on to website this is my 100th video on YouTube by the way this is my hundredth cooking show okay so I wanted to cover something that was you know something that's popular on the website it delivered onions ofsp is one of the very first recipes I put on the website way back in 2006 now and it's still going strong everyday people are still looking up that recipe like crazy so that's great guys eat your liver and onions so I hope you go on check me out on Twitter at cooking with Kim Lee with a capital e go on and follow me go to the Facebook fan page at facebook.com slash cooking with Kimberly check out the show on YouTube youtube.com slash cooking with Kimberly and the website is cooking with Kimberly calm I hope you guys eat deliciously and I'll show you a picture of this delicious liver dish when we're done and that's it Charl guys bye you