Beef Liver substitute

Best substitute

Calf's liver (calves liver, veal liver)

Use the same amount by weight as the beef liver you are replacing

Best for liver and onions

Close match

The best substitutes for beef liver are calf's liver, which is the same organ from a young animal and is much milder and more tender, or chicken livers, which are milder still, cheaper and available everywhere. Pork liver is closest to beef in strength. If you want the savoury depth without any organ meat at all, finely chopped mushrooms with a spoonful of soy sauce or a little anchovy paste will supply the meaty, iron-tinged savour in a pate, ragu or meatloaf, though not the texture.

Other beef liver substitutes

Ranked, with the exact amount to use

2Chicken livers
Different texture
Use the same amount by weight
Cheap, in almost every supermarket, and much milder and creamier than beef liver, with a softer, more custardy texture when cooked.
What changes
They are excellent in pate, in a Tuscan crostini topping, in a rich pasta sauce or seared with sherry and onions. Because they are small and thin they cook in two to three minutes total, and they will not slice into the flat pieces liver and onions wants, so the presentation changes even where the flavour works. Slightly sweeter, considerably less metallic.
Best for
pate, crostini, pasta sauces, dirty rice, budget cooking
Trim the greenish gall spots and any connective threads. They are bitter.
3Pork liver
Close match
Use the same amount by weight
The closest match in intensity, so this is the substitute for someone who actually likes strong liver rather than one trying to soften it.
What changes
It is dark, firm and forceful, with a slightly bitter edge that beef liver does not have, and it is the traditional liver for many pates, terrines and liverwurst. Soak it in milk for an hour, which pulls out some of the bitterness noticeably. Cook it as you would beef liver, briefly and to just barely pink inside.
Best for
pate and terrines, liverwurst, sausage mixtures, strongly flavoured dishes
The milk soak matters more here than with any other liver.
4Lamb liver or goat liver
Close match
Use the same amount by weight
Between calf and beef in intensity, with a slightly gamy, distinctly sweet quality, and the standard liver in Middle Eastern, Turkish and South Asian cooking, where it is cubed and fried hard with cumin and chile.
What changes
It is more tender than beef liver and thinner, so it cooks in a minute or two. In liver and onions it works perfectly well and gives a rounder, less metallic result. Widely stocked at halal butchers and often inexpensive.
Best for
fried liver with cumin, kebabs and skewers, liver and onions, curries
Cut it into small cubes rather than slices for Middle Eastern and South Asian recipes.
5Finely chopped mushrooms with soy sauce or a little anchovy
Taste and texture differ
Use 8 ounces mushrooms for every 8 ounces liver, plus 1 to 2 teaspoons soy sauce
The honest answer when liver is being used as a background flavour rather than the main event, as in a meatloaf, a bolognese, a stuffing or a pate.
What changes
Cook chopped cremini or shiitake mushrooms hard until browned and dry, then add soy sauce or half a teaspoon of anchovy paste. This gives the deep savoury, faintly iron-like undertone liver contributes, and it does it well. It will not give you liver's dense crumbly texture, and it cannot carry a dish that is named after liver.
Best for
meatloaf and meatballs, bolognese, stuffing, vegetarian pate, hidden liver in family cooking
Cook the mushrooms until genuinely dry and browned. Watery mushrooms taste of nothing.
6Beef heart or kidney
Taste and texture differ
Use the same amount by weight
Other organ meats, both far milder than liver in the specific iron-and-mineral direction that people find difficult.
What changes
Beef heart is the surprise: it is dense, lean muscle that tastes like a rich, slightly mineral steak and can be sliced thin and seared, so it satisfies the nutritional reason many people eat liver while being much easier to enjoy. Kidney is more assertive and faintly ammoniac and needs a soak in salted water first. Neither will pass as liver in liver and onions.
Best for
organ meat nutrition, grilling and searing, steak and kidney pie, adventurous cooking
For heart, trim the tough silverskin and hard fat, slice thin across the grain, and sear it fast.

What is Beef Liver?

Beef Liver is a dense dark-red organ meat, also sold as ox liver, with a soft crumbly texture and a strong iron-and-mineral flavour, cooked fast in thin slices for liver and onions or ground into pate and meat mixtures, where it works as a deeply savoury, faintly bitter backbone rather than a neutral protein.

Cooking tips

Soak liver in milk or buttermilk for 30 to 60 minutes and pat it dry before cooking. This is the one step that makes the biggest difference to the strong metallic edge, and it applies to beef, pork and lamb liver alike. Discard the milk afterwards.
Undercook rather than overcook. Liver should come off the heat while the centre is still faintly pink, which means about two minutes a side for a half-inch slice of beef liver and less for calf or lamb. Fully cooked-through liver turns grainy, dry and chalky, which is what most people who say they hate liver have actually eaten.
Peel off the thin outer membrane and cut out the tougher white veins before cooking. If left on, the membrane shrinks in the pan and curls the slice, and the veins stay rubbery no matter how carefully you cook it.
Onions are not a garnish here, they are the counterweight. Cook them slowly for twenty minutes until genuinely sweet and brown before the liver goes in the pan, and add a splash of vinegar, sherry or lemon at the end. The sweetness and the acid are what make strong liver taste balanced rather than metallic.
Dredge the slices in seasoned flour and cook them in bacon fat or butter over medium-high heat. The flour gives a thin crust that holds the juices in during the very short cooking time, which matters because liver has no fat of its own to keep it moist.

Frequently asked questions

What is the mildest substitute for beef liver?

Chicken livers are the mildest and the easiest to buy, with a creamy texture that suits pate and pasta sauces. Calf's liver is the mildest option that still slices and cooks like beef liver, and it is what most restaurants use for liver and onions, though it costs considerably more. If you want mild organ meat that does not taste of liver at all, beef heart is worth trying, since it eats much more like a lean steak.

Is calf's liver the same as beef liver?

It is the same organ from a much younger animal, which changes it a great deal. Calf's liver, also spelled calves liver, is paler, softer, sweeter and far less strongly mineral, and it cooks in about half the time. Any beef liver recipe works with it if you shorten the cooking, and it is the version to buy if a previous bad experience with liver put you off. Ox liver is simply another name for the adult beef version.

Can I just leave the liver out?

It depends what it is doing. In a meatloaf, bolognese, stuffing or terrine where liver is a background savoury note, yes, leave it out and add a couple of teaspoons of soy sauce or half a teaspoon of anchovy paste plus browned chopped mushrooms to replace the depth. In liver and onions or a chicken liver pate the liver is the dish itself, so you would be cooking something else entirely.

Why does my liver taste bitter and metallic?

Usually one of three things. It was overcooked, which turns liver grainy and sharpens the mineral taste, so aim for faintly pink in the centre. It was not soaked, and a 30-minute milk soak removes a surprising amount of that edge. Or the veins and membrane were left in, which adds bitterness and chew. Pork liver is naturally the most bitter of the common livers, so try lamb or calf instead.

Are all livers interchangeable in a recipe?

Broadly yes for flavour purposes, as long as you adjust for strength and cooking time. Order them from mildest to strongest as chicken, calf, lamb, beef, pork, and shorten the cooking for the smaller and younger ones. Where they are not interchangeable is shape: chicken livers cannot be sliced into flat pieces for liver and onions, and a whole beef liver will not spread into a smooth pate as easily as chicken livers do.

Related substitutes

More meat & protein substitutes

Beef Liver substitute

Other beef liver substitutes

2Chicken livers

3Pork liver

4Lamb liver or goat liver

5Finely chopped mushrooms with soy sauce or a little anchovy

6Beef heart or kidney