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To Pot Venison

A preserved dish of venison seasoned with mace and pepper, pressed into pots and sealed under clarified butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Vinegar and red wine work together. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 575 recipes. Both carry sotolon, which smells curry, maple. The science ↓

To Pot Venison

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the venison

  1. Rub the venison with vinegar and let it sit for 1 hour.

  2. Dry it with a cloth and rub it with red wine.

  3. Season with mace, pepper, and salt.

Bake

  1. Place it on an earthen dish and pour over ½ pint of red wine and 1 pound of butter.

  2. If using a shoulder, cover it with coarse paste and bake in a 300°F (150°C) oven overnight.

Pot and store

  1. Once done, remove the bones and beat the meat in a mortar with the fat from the gravy.

  2. If needed, add more seasoning and clarified butter, and beat until it forms a fine paste.

  3. Press the mixture into pots and pour clarified butter over it, then store in a dry place.

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. Vinegar + red winetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together575 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

  2. Venison + red winetop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together167 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Vinegar + peppertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  4. Red wine + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,599 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  5. Red wine + peppertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,075 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

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

What each ingredient does

Venison
Forms the main body of the dish, becoming a spreadable paste once beaten with fat.
Butter
Adds richness and moisture, and seals the potted meat from air when poured over it.
Red wine
Adds moisture and deep flavour to the meat during the long soak and bake.
Vinegar
Its acidity helps tenderise the surface of the venison before cooking.

The step that matters

Bake in a low oven overnight. Baking at a low 300°F for a long time slowly breaks down the tough connective tissue in venison, so the meat becomes tender enough to beat into a paste.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (venison, vinegar, red wine, pepper, butter):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Rosemaryfits better
  3. Clovefits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against venison, vinegar, red wine, pepper, butter. 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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