Sheila's "Spread" Trio for a Party

The last few parties that I have thrown or attended, I made this trio to go with garlic toast rounds and baguette.

I first read about slow-roasted tomatoes or Pomodori al Forno from Molly on the Orangette blog several years ago. She sprinkled hers with ground coriander. These tomatoes are wonderful on top of a mound of goat cheese that has been smeared on a piece of baguette. I have since explored using various herbs and have found my favorite to be the following:

Slow-Roasted Tomatoes
2-3 lb roma tomatoes
1 t sea salt
1 t sugar
1 t oregano
5 basil leaves, chopped
1 c olive oil
2 cloves fresh garlic, chopped

Slice roma tomatoes length-wise and remove stem. Put cut side up in a 9 x 13 baking dish. Pour olive oil over the top and sprinkle with salt, sugar, and oregano. Bake for 1 hour at 225 degrees. Turn tomatoes over and bake for another hour. Keep doing this for a total roasting time of 5-6 hours. In a pretty glass dish, layer tomatoes with a few sprinkles of fresh garlic and basil leaves. Pour the oil from the dish over the top. Serve at room temperature with goat cheese and baguette if you do not want to make the rest of the trio.

You can complete another "spread" at the same time.

Roasted Garlic

Throw whole garlic cloves in the oil with the tomatoes, using one or two heads of garlic. When the tomatoes are finished, remove the garlic cloves and mash in a bowl with 1 t of salt.

This recipe for chicken liver pate for kids caught my eye on Slate by Nicholas Day. The kids really do love it. Everyone does.

Chicken Liver Spread
7 oz chicken livers
3 T unsalted butter
2 shallots, finely chopped
1 sprig rosemary or 1/2 t dried
2 T capers, rinsed and drained
2 T dry vermouth
2 t red wine vinegar
coarse salt

In a frying pan, melt the butter over medium-low heat. Add shallots and rosemary sprig. Cook for about 5 minutes or until the shallots are soft.

Meanwhile, dry the livers and sprinkle with salt and pepper. After the shallot has softened, add livers to the pan and cook for about three minutes per side or until they are slightly pink in the middle. Take the pan off the heat and transfer shallots and liver to food processor (remove the rosemary sprig).  Add the capers.

Return the pan to heat and add vermouth. Bring vermouth to a boil and deglaze the pan, scraping up all the bits on the bottom until the vermouth is reduced by half; add 1/2 t coarse salt and vinegar. Stir then add to the food processor. Process until you have a coarse paste. Taste and adjust seasoning.


Now you are ready to assemble your trio into a nice holiday tray.  Use three similarly-sized bowls that will fit on a large serving tray. Roughly chop the tomatoes and place them in one bowl with some of the oil. Put the smashed roasted garlic in another bowl and the chicken liver spread in the last bowl. Arrange bowls in the middle of the tray and surround them with the garlic toast rounds and slices of baguette. Set a log of goat cheese off to the side if you wish.