# cod liver
## English
### Alternative forms

* cod-liver (rare)
* codliver

### Noun

cod liver (countable and uncountable, plural cod livers)
* The liver of codfish.
** 1927, Charles E. Bills, “The Principal Chemical Researches on Cod Liver Oil”, in W[illiam] A[lbert] Noyes, editor, Chemical Reviews, volume III, Baltimore, Md., pages 430 and 432:The menhaden ester fractions were worked up more thoroughly than the cod liver esters, but it was assumed, on the basis of the indicated similarity, that the cod liver oil possessed essentially the same composition as the menhaden. […] Bell (1851) wrote that pigs which ate cod livers became very fat, and their fat acquired the color and odor of cod liver oil.
** 1937 November, Philip H. Smith, Inspection of Commercial Feedstuffs (Massachusetts Agricultural Experiment Station, Control Series, Bulletin No. 89), Amherst, Mass.: Massachusetts State College, page 34:Community Chick Mash / Yellow corn meal or hominy, feeding oat meal, wheat bran, wheat middlings, red dog middlings, alfalfa meal, dried milk, choice meat scraps, fish meal, precipitated bone meal, calcium carbonate, cod liver meal, cod liver oil, salt.
** 1952, Curt Riess, “The City That Is Different”, in The Berlin Story, New York, N.Y.: The Dial Press, →LCCN, page 261:The Berliners stuffed themselves with fish. They ate cod and cod livers by preference, because this was a fatty, tasty dish and not too expensive. It was true that after eating cod liver you smelled of it for a long while, but the Berliners were highly vitamin-conscious by now—and rightly so.
** 1967 March, “Japanese Technicians Observe Soviet North Atlantic Operations”, in Commercial Fisheries Review, volume 29, number 3, page 25, column 1:They spent 40 days aboard Soviet vessel off Southern Labrador and observed fishing and processing of cod and ocean perch into fillets, canned cod liver, cod-liver oil, dressed cod and perch, and meal.
** 1970, LaVern Rippley, “German Food”, in Of German Ways, Minneapolis, Minn.: Dillon Press, Inc., published 1973, →ISBN, page 252:Canned cod liver is available any place, as are smoked flounder and German caviar, not to mention a wide selection of sardines.
** 1988 February 4, Proceedings of the Standing Senate Committee on Fisheries, […] the Queen’s Printer for Canada, page 25 : 127, column 2:A few years ago, during the 50s, there was no problem with cod liver. […] We could buy this product anywhere, in Quebec City and in Montreal; this canned cod liver was excellent, much better than the product which is now being sold by Denmark. […] I think we could do something about this cod liver which is produced on the Labrador Coast. […] Not only that, but most of the fishermen I talked to, in Newfoundland for example, the mere idea of eating cod liver makes them sick.
** 1990, Geoffrey Howard, “Thief in the Night”, in Wheelbarrow Across the Sahara, Stroud, Glos, Wolfeboro Falls, N.H.: Alan Sutton, →ISBN, page 167:Ate cod livers bought in Arlit – awful.
** 1995, Roy Davies, “Catching Up”, in Nautilus: The Story of Man Under the Sea, Annapolis, Md.: Naval Institute Press, →ISBN, page 29:Zviltsov remembered that everyone looked towards the refrigerator for protection against radiation poisoning. The crew ate cod-liver pâté and drank vodka. Both were thought to be effective but he still praises the properties of vodka: ‘One hundred and fifty grams of vodka after a day’s work eliminated any radiation effects and restored the metabolism,’ he recalled.
** 1999, Annamarie Beckel, All Gone Widdun, St. John’s, N.L.: Breakwater Books, →ISBN, page 23:It was the height of the cod season, and the south shore was lined with stages and flakes for heading, splitting, and drying fish, vats for rendering cod livers into oil.
** 2007, Kristberg Kristbergsson, Sigurjon Arason, “Utilization of By-Products in the Fish Industry”, in Vasso Oreopoulou, Winfried Russ, editors, Utilization of By-Products and Treatment of Waste in the Food Industry (ISEKI-Food: Integrating Safety and Environmental Knowledge Into Food Studies towards European Sustainable Development; 3), New York, N.Y.: Springer Science+Business Media, →ISBN, page 245:Today there is more demand for cod liver than is being supplied from the ungutted fish brought ashore for processing (Ogmundsson, 2005). All the liver brought ashore is being utilized and most of it is used for the production of cod liver oil for dietary supplementations (Table 12.4). However, there are still large quantities of round fish liver discarded at sea. Another popular food item for many is canned cod liver but the availability is low and the annual production in Iceland has only been ~200 tons mostly due to lack of raw material.
** 2008, Jess Winfield, chapter 27, in My Name Is Will: A Novel of Sex, Drugs, and Shakespeare, New York, N.Y.: Twelve, →ISBN, page 184:He was hit by a hundred different scents at once. Myrrh, sulfur, mustard, rotting cod liver.
** 2009 May 5, Proceedings of the Standing Senate Committee on Fisheries and Oceans, the w:Senate of Canada, page 5:19, column 1:I do not know if you study it, but seals eat cod liver. We have heard that sometimes, the seal does not eat the rest of the fish. They just eat the liver because it has fat and they do not get hungry.
** 2013, Anya von Bremzen, “1970s: Mayonnaise of My Homeland”, in Mastering the Art of Soviet Cooking: A Memoir of Food and Longing, New York, N.Y.: Crown Publishers, →ISBN, part III (Anya), page 203:And eagerly we awaited Baballa’s holiday zakaz, the elite take-home package of defitsit goods from Gosstroy. You never knew what each year would bring. I prayed for the buttery balik (smoked sturgeon) instead of the prestigious but disgusting canned cod liver.
** 2013, Mary Ellen Snodgrass, World Food: An Encyclopedia of History, Culture, and Social Influence from Hunter-Gatherers to the Age of Globalization‎, Armonk, N.Y.: Sharpe Reference, →ISBN:The Inuit ate cod livers with bilberries, cranberries, and crowberries.
** 2015, Sylvi Inez Liljegren, translated by Janet Holmén, “Meanwhile, the kitchen is on fire”, in The Ice is Melting: Ethics in the Arctic, Bergen: Fagbokforlaget, →ISBN, page 62:Inuit children in Greenland already have high concentrations of lead and mercury in their blood, people living along the coasts can no longer eat cod liver or seabird eggs, and women who nurse their babies must live with anxiety at the thought of the environmental toxins that leave their bodies along with their breast milk.

#### Derived terms

* cod liver oil