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Haunch of Venison Roasted

A roasted haunch of venison cooked with butter, flour, claret, and spices, served with a gravy made from venison scraps.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 15 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,686 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Haunch of Venison Roasted

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 the haunch

  1. Wash the haunch in lukewarm water if its outside is hard.

  2. Rub the haunch with butter or lard.

  3. Lay the haunch in a dripping pan.

  4. Cover the top and sides of the haunch with a paste made of flour and water, about ½ inch thick.

  5. Cover the haunch with a thin buttered paper and a sheet of parchment, securing with buttered twine.

  6. Pour a little water into the pan.

Roast

  1. Place the pan in a 400°F (200°C) oven.

  2. Baste occasionally with butter and hot water to prevent burning.

  3. Cook for 4 to 5 hours, depending on the size, checking doneness with a skewer.

  4. Remove the paper and paste from the haunch.

  5. Baste frequently with claret and butter.

Make the gravy and serve

  1. Stew 1 pound of raw venison scraps in 1½ pints of water with cloves, nutmeg, salt, and cayenne until reduced by one third.

  2. Strain the gravy.

  3. Return the gravy to the saucepan with currant jelly, claret, and butter mixed with browned and white flour.

  4. Serve the gravy in a gravy boat.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

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.

  1. Clove + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,686 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Venison + curranttop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together443 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  5. Clove + curranttop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,038 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

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

Flour
Forms a protective paste crust that shields the haunch from drying and burning in the oven.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and moisture, and helps the surface brown during basting.
Venison scraps
Simmered into a stock that gives the gravy its meaty body and flavour.
Browned flour
Thickens the gravy and adds a toasted, nutty colour and flavour.
Currant jelly
Adds sweetness and a fruity tang that balances the rich gravy.
Claret
Adds acidity and wine flavour when basted onto the meat and stirred into the gravy.

The step that matters

Removing the paste and paper. The flour paste and paper protect the meat early on; removing them at the right time lets the surface dry and brown. Basting with claret and butter then builds colour and flavour.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (venison, butter, flour, clove, nutmeg):

  1. Raisinfits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Lemonfits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against venison, butter, flour, clove, nutmeg. 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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