Why it works: Butter and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓
Venison
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Prepare and roast
Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).
Cover the fat of the venison with white butter and then with a paste made of flour and water.
Roast the venison for 5 hours, basting with salted water and butter as it warms.
About 25 minutes before it is done, remove the covering from the fat and cleanse the dripping pan.
Prepare melted butter and baste the haunch after dredging it lightly with flour.
Finish and serve
Garnish with white paper around the knuckles.
Prepare gravy with the browned butter left in the pan or a fancy gravy with wine or acids.
Serve with currant jelly or cranberry sauce, hot or cold.
Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.
Explore the science
The flavor team
The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.
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Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Venison + curranttop 13% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together443 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).
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Butter + saucetop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together15,338 recipes
Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
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Flour + cranberrytop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together268 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Venison + buttertop 16% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together957 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Venison haunch
- Lean meat that is the main dish; roasting cooks it and browns its surface.
- White butter
- Covers the fat and later bastes the meat, adding moisture and richness as it roasts.
- Flour
- Forms a protective paste over the fat that shields the lean meat from drying out.
- Currant jelly
- Adds sweetness and acidity that balance the rich, gamey flavour of the meat.
The step that matters
Removing the covering 25 minutes before done. The flour paste protects the meat from drying during the long roast. Removing it near the end lets the fat and surface brown and crisp, while the pan must be cleaned so drippings do not burn and turn bitter.
Swap the currant
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (venison, butter, flour, cranberry, sauce):
- Applefits better
- Red currantfits better
- Raisinfits better
- Currantthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against venison, butter, flour, cranberry, sauce. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.
“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.
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