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As Venison

A preserved venison breast dried and smoked with herbs and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 15 ingredients
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Why it works: Thyme and marjoram match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,225 recipes. Both carry terpineol, which smells pine, woody. The science ↓

As Venison

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the meat

  1. Remove the outer skin and bones from the mutton breast.

  2. Sprinkle coarse sugar generously over the inside flesh. Place a tasteless board on top of the meat and weigh it down. Let the meat sit for 48 hours.

Make the cure

  1. In a pot, combine thyme, marjoram, eschalots, nutmeg, sea salt, white pepper, and old ale. Boil the mixture for 20 minutes.

  2. Rub the mixture on both sides of the meat for at least 20 minutes. Place the meat in a deep vessel with its sugar or pickle. Keep rubbing the meat for 7 to 9 days.

Dry and smoke

  1. Afterward, dry the meat with cloths.

  2. Layer bay leaves and laurel in a dry tub. Place the breast on top. Cover with more leaves and herbs.

  3. Wash the meat in vinegar and table beer for 5 minutes. Hang the meat to dry for 24 hours.

  4. Roll the meat up tightly and bind it. Hang it in a chimney to dry without much smoke. Use beech chips, grass turfs, and sawdust for drying over a week.

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. Thyme + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: terpineol (pine, woody).

  2. Thyme + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  3. Marjoram + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,979 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  4. Thyme + laureltop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,444 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  5. Marjoram + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together687 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Mutton breast
Forms the lean meat that the cure penetrates and dries into jerky.
Sea salt
Draws out moisture and seasons the meat, helping preserve it during curing.
Coarse sugar
Balances the salt and adds mild sweetness to the cured surface.
Old ale
Adds liquid and malty flavour to the cure mixture.
Eschalots
Contribute aromatic sweetness and savour to the cure.

The step that matters

Drying the cured meat in the chimney. Drying slowly in low smoke lets moisture leave evenly, so the meat becomes firm and shelf-stable rather than case-hardened or spoiled on the outside.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mutton, sugar, thyme, marjoram, nutmeg, laurel, parsley):

  1. Winter savoryfits better
  2. Allspicefits better
  3. Sagefits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mutton, sugar, thyme, marjoram, nutmeg, laurel, parsley. 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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