Superb Liver and Onions

Based on this wonderful recipe over at Edible Aria.  I made some tweaks:  used chicken liver instead of beef (butcher was closed on Sunday, so no grass-fed beef available, but grocer was open and they had organic chicken livers); added 1 huge clove garlic (more would have been better), and 1 sweet red pepper; we also substituted coconut flour for the wheat flour.  (Next time, I'd probably omit the flour all together, and just make sure to flash cook the morsels of liver so they're not over-done.)

Ingredients:

• 2 T bacon fat
• 6 slices bacon, chopped (not too small, imo; and of course, more or less as desired---this is what we had on hand, and Mom is a lipophobe so this amount of bacon is probably all she could conceive of three  people eating in one meal! Poor woman...)
• 1 sliced onion (more or less, depending on carb tolerance)
• 2 T grass-fed butter (we used Kerrygold, nummy!)
• 3/4 lb crimini mushrooms (an estimate; more or less to taste)
• 1 sliced sweet red pepper
• 1 clove garlic (more would be better, imo; crush, mince, garlic press it---whatever your normal garlic routine is)
• 1 bunch scallions, chopped into 1-inch(ish) pieces  (on the bias is prettiest, imo, but I was lazy and hungry and wanted to get on with things)
• 1 lb liver, cut into pieces of desired size (chicken is pictured), preferably from an animal raised humanely and on species-appropriate food (cow chow should be largely grass, imo; and chicken chow should be bugs and grass and worms and seeds and whatever else they peck up when they're walking and pooping all over the place---sorry to say "poop" when discussing food, Dad!)
• coconut flour with salt and pepper to taste, for dredging liver pieces--we used about 1 cup, but of course there was around 2/3 of a cup wasted, as that's the nature of dredging in flour  (I will omit this entirely next time---I think it only served to thicken the dish, which almost resulted in a scorched pan and bottom layer of food, and I couldn't discern that it added anything; possibly wheat flour would have better results, but Mom has celiac and I don't do grains)
• 1/2 bunch of parsley, chopped (more or less to taste)
• 1/2 pack of fresh sage, chopped (more or less to taste; more would be better, imo; keep a few for nice garnish at the end, if desired)

Instructions (see updates at bottom of post):

1. Melt the bacon fat over medium-low heat, and then add the bacon pieces and cook until the new fat has rendered.  The bacon will be mostly crisp at this point, which is good.
2. Add the onion, and cook until it's well on its way to being browned.
3. Add the butter, and stir to incorporate it while it melts, then add all the mushrooms.  Cook them until they're pretty done and getting "toasty" looking around the edges.  Mushrooms absorb fat nicely!
4. Add the chopped pepper and garlic, and cook (still low-ish heat) until very fragrant and droolsome.  Get the plates ready, and get the liver ready during the previous steps, because after the pepper starts to get a little cooked-looking, things will move relatively fast compared to the earlier "hurry up and wait" steps.  Give the pan one last good stir when the peppers look cooked through-ish.
5. Lay the liver pieces quickly and efficiently (as well as you can!  Don't stress out) in the pan on top of the goodies, and wait for about 90 seconds.  Then turn each liver piece over and wait another 60 seconds or so.  
6. Toss in the parsley and sage at this point (earlier if you like them more cooked; consider reserving a little sage for fresh garnish at the end)
7. Then gently stir everything as needed.  The liver pieces cook pretty damn fast compared to the earlier steps.  Really and truly, when people say not to over cook liver, there's a good reason for that!  Take the pan off the heat when the liver is still pretty darn pink.  While you fumble around and pour the wine and get the plates, it will cook a little more, so don't worry about it.
8. Plate, serve, eat, and enjoy!

Below are some pics from the middle and end stages.

This is the pan with everything in it except the liver, parsley, and sage:

Here is the flour-dusted liver, alongside the chopped parsley and sage:

And here is the final dish, plated (a few baked green beans in lower left---just ignore, I did!)

(Apologies for blurry and dark photo.  I need to learn how to take better pictures!)


Edited 4-Nov-12:
I made this tonight, and made the following changes:

• used 3 different mushrooms: crimini, shitaki, and maitake (stinky but good!)
• added 1/2 cup red wine as mushrooms were cooking (NOTE: if I hadn't used the maitake, which are very strongly flavored, I'd have used vermouth)
• used 4 whole garlic cloves (pressed, then chopped up and added the skins)
• put in my liver naked (in other words, didn't dredge in flour/salt/pepper)
• added 1/2ish tsp mélange classique; will use a tad more next time