Easy Way To Get Liver In Your Diet | Liver Cubes
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Liver is incredibly nutrient-dense and conveniently budget-friendly, making it a valuable addition to your meals. Despite its acquired taste, it’s known as nature’s multivitamin due to its rich nutrient profile. Liver cubes are the easiest way to incorporate liver into your family’s diet, ensuring they benefit from its abundance of vitamins and minerals without compromising on the flavour or texture of your meals!
I always have beef liver cubes in my freezer and has become a part of my regular routine in meal preparation. It is the easiest, sneakiest and cleanest way I have come up with to add liver to our meals.
Why would I want to add this peculiar ingredient to my meals? Let’s get into it.
Why Beef Liver?
Beef liver is highly valued in many cultures around the world. In traditional diets and indigenous cuisines, liver was often prized as a nutrient-rich food that provided essential vitamins and minerals, including iron, vitamin A, vitamin B12, and folate. Because of its nutritional value, it was commonly used to support general health, a healthy pregnancy and the development of robust babies.
The Benefits of Beef Liver for General Health
Beef liver is often called a superfood because it’s packed with nutrients that can greatly benefit your health. Here are some simple reasons why adding liver to your diet can be a good idea:
- Loaded with Nutrients: Liver is full of important vitamins and minerals like vitamin A, vitamin D, and B vitamins. Liver especially high in vitamin B12, which is great for your energy and helps keep your blood and nerves healthy .
- Great Source of Iron: Liver is rich in a type of iron that your body can easily absorb. This can help prevent and treat iron deficiency anemia, which makes you feel tired and weak .
- High in Protein: Liver provides a lot of high-quality protein, which is essential for building and repairing tissues, making hormones, and supporting your immune system .
- Good for Your Brain and Liver: Liver is one of the best sources of choline, a nutrient that supports brain function and helps your liver process fats effectively .
- Contains Antioxidants: Liver has antioxidants like glutathione, which help protect your cells from damage and support your body’s natural detox processes .
- Supports Vision and Skin Health: Liver is extremely rich in vitamin A, which is important for maintaining healthy vision, skin, and immune function.
How Much Liver Should I Eat?
A healthy and sustainable amount of liver consumption for an adult would be around 2-4 oz a week and 1-2 oz per week for a child. These liver cubes are around 2oz which makes it easy to calculate your intake. Aim to use 1-2 liver cubes per adult that you’re cooking for per week. If you want to add liver to your children’s diet, simply share this liver-enriched food with your children and they will reap the benefits from their usual portion of the meal!
Different Animal Livers
Beef: Grass-fed beef liver is the cream of the crop when it comes to animal liver. It contains the highest level of vitamin A, B vitamins (especially B12), iron, zinc, and copper. Grass-fed beef liver is created on a natural diet versus other animals that get fed commercial feed. The liver made on a natural diet is usually higher in certain nutrient such as omega-3 fatty acids and vitamin E. The nutrient density is often more consistent due to the natural diet of the cows.
Chicken: Chicken livers are the next best option. They are also very affordable and have a more mild taste than beef liver. They are rich in vitamin A, B vitamins, folate, and selenium. Look for pasture-raised chicken liver or at least organic to get the more consistent nutrient density.
Cod: Cod liver is a nutrient powerhouse. It’s been valued for centuries for its rich supply of vitamins A and D, as well as omega-3 fatty acids. It’s known for supporting immune function, promoting healthy vision, and contributing to bone health. Cod liver oil, made from cod liver, is often used as a supplement to boost overall health and well-being.
Pork: Pork liver may be my last choice for liver unless they are pasture raised pigs. Pork liver is still nutrient dense and high in vitamin B1 (thiamine), B12, vitamin A, and iron. However, pigs are often fed the lowest quality of food to fatten them up quickly which could compromise the quality of the meat and liver.
If the only liver you can source is conventional liver from the grocery store, then choose beef liver. Conventionally grown beef liver still remains natures multivitamin and if that’s all you can get, it is better than no liver in your diet at all.
Organ Meat Cubes
You can most definitely use a blend of other organ meats to make organ meat cubes. You can include organ meats such as heart, brain, intestines, tripe, pancreas, thymus, tongue, kidney, and more, depending on how adventurous you are. I personally like a blend of beef liver, heart, and brain.
Recipe Tip: Soak The Liver In Milk
Soaking liver before blending helps reduce its strong, metallic flavour and improves texture when you cook it—especially useful if you’re new to eating liver or serving it to hesitant family members.
I recommend soaking sliced liver in milk, lemon water, or lightly salted water for 30 minutes to 2 hours. This draws out impurities and softens the taste.
I don’t always do this step, I don’t mind the taste at this point. But if you’re particularily grossed out by liver, give it a whirl.
Animal Welfare
In my personal opinion, consuming organ meats is the best way to support animal welfare and your own health. Organ meats often go to waste because they are usually an acquired taste and an unpopular cut. So, if you are concerned about animal cruelty or waste and have considered going vegan or vegetarian because of it, consuming organ meats is a great way to value animals and reduce the waste of an animal without compromising your own health.
The medical information on this site is provided as an information resource only, and is not to be used or relied on for any diagnostic or treatment purposes. Please consult your health care provider before making any health care decisions or for guidance about a specific medical condition.
Ways To Use Liver Cubes
What You’ll Need
2lbs Liver (beef, chicken, pork, lamb)
Strong Blender
How To Make Liver Cubes
Pull out your livers. Make sure they are fully thawed if they were previously frozen.
Add livers to your blender.
Place the lid on your blend and hold firmly onto it. Start with the slowest setting, it may shake while it’s breaking down the fibrous livers.
Once your blender is blending more smoothly, turn up to the medium speed. Continue to hold the blender steady.
Once it’s blending smoothly again, turn up to the highest speed. Let it blend for a minute or two until very smooth. It shouldn’t be shaking anymore and you should be able to walk away from it.
Once the liver is blended well and looks like a strawberry smoothie, pull out your silicone muffin tray.
Fill each cup to the top with blended liver.
Freeze.
Once frozen, pop the frozen liver out of the cups and store in Ziploc bag.
When you’re cooking, add one frozen liver cube per pound of ground meat whenever you cook ground meat. No one will know it’s in there!
Liver Cubes
Ingredients
- 2 lbs liver beef, chicken, lamb, pork
Instructions
- Pull out your liver, make sure they are fully thawed if from frozen.
- Add livers to your blender.
- Place the lid on your blend and hold firmly onto it. Start with the slowest setting, it may shake while it's breaking down the fibrous livers.
- Once your blender is blending more smoothly, turn up to the medium speed. Continue to hold the blender steady.
- Once it's blending smoothly again, turn up to the highest speed. Let it blend for a minute or two until very smooth. It shouldn't be shaking anymore and you should be able to walk away from it.
- Once the liver is fully blended and smooth. Pull out your silicone muffin tray.
- Fill each cup to the top with blended liver.Â
- Freeze.
- Once frozen, pop the frozen liver out of the cups and store in Ziploc bag.
- Add a frozen liver cube whenever you cook ground meat and it's magically hidden!
Notes
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Does it come out of the muffin tin easily? I don’t have a silicone muffin tin, so just trying to figure out if I can use a regular one…
I would use the paper muffin tin liners in that case 🙂
that is just brilliant Bronwyn! I used to hide things in meals but never thought of the liver trick. I love this recipe and thank you for the reminder about the liver.!
liver is the best thing to sneak in! can also be done with other organ meats, i just made ground beef heart pucks