Yom Kippur has come and gone with wishes for an easy fast, a good year, to be inscribed in the book of life. If you’ve read this blog for a while, you’ll have concluded that I enjoy cooking for my family, for friends, for guests. Cooking for holidays or other occasions, or no occasion at all. This year, though, I decided I did not really want to cook for our family Kippur breakfast.

I thought bagels with lox and cream cheese would make a simple, nice and easy dinner for Constant Companion, Daughter, and me to enjoy after a long day of fasting.

Then, the supermarket had beautiful, fresh chicken livers and traditional chopped chicken liver entered the menu.

Then I remembered that I had fixings for a nice olive and sun-dried tomato tapenade and that, too, was added to our simple menu.

Chopped chicken liver. First make your chicken schmaltz. This is really easy. When you clean your next chicken, cut off all the fat and some extra skin. Put into a skillet at a medium heat and cook til all the fat is rendered. Drain off the fat (the schmaltz) and continue cooking the bits til they are browned and crunchy. They are the gribenes, yummy, tasty bits. You can do the same with trimmings from a duck and get wonderful, beautiful duck fat.

Rinse and dry about a pound of chicken livers. Throw away any pieces that look green or are not firm. Line a baking pan with aluminum foil. Distribute the livers on the pan, lightly salt with kosher salt. Broil about 7-10 minutes. Turn, salt again, and broil for 3-4 minutes.

Chop one or two onions. Brown in about 3 tbsp of your schmaltz in a skillet for 15 minutes, til softened.

When cooled, spin the livers in your food processor until smooth. Add the onions, one chopped hard-boiled egg, and several tbsps. of schmaltz. You can add a bit of brandy and thyme.

Olive/sun-dried tomato tapenade. Combine the following in the bowl of your food processor: 1 1/2 cups of mixed Greek olives,1 tbsp capers, 3 tbsp sun-dried tomato, 2 minced garlic cloves, 3 tbsp dried parsley and basel each, ½ tsp lemon zest and ¼ olive oil. Pulse until fully chopped and mixed.

And with this small feast around the kitchen table we enter into the new year wishing for the best it will bring us.