On Food and Cooking

synonymous, though today “pâté” usually
suggests a fairly uniform and fine-textured
mixture based on liver, “terrine” a coarser,
often patterned one. Pâtés and terrines thus
span a wonderful range, from coarse, rustic
massings of pork innards and head in the
French pâté de campagne, to luxurious
layerings of brandy-scented foie gras and
truffles.
Modern pâtés and terrines often contain
little fat, but traditional mixes were based on
a meat to fat ratio of around 2 to 1 to give a
rich, melt-in-the-mouth consistency. Pork and
veal, an immature meat with relatively little
tough connective tissue and an abundant
producer of gelatin, are the usual main
ingredients. They are ground together with the
fat — usually pork for its ideal consistency —
to mix protein and fat intimately. Hand
chopping is less likely to heat the mixture or
damage intact fat cells, which would cause
more liquid fat to separate from the mix