Name: Venison Steaks
Ingredients: Venison steaks; Coarse sea salt; Black pepper; Butter

Why it works: Venison and butter work together. They rank in the top 16% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 957 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Venison Steaks

Ingredients

Venison steaks
Coarse sea salt
Black pepper
Butter

Directions

The book gives no cooking times; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Preheat your grill or broiler.
Season the venison steaks with coarse sea salt and black pepper.
Broil the steaks until they are rare, about 4-5 minutes per side.
Serve with a pat of butter on top.

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.

Venison + buttertop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together957 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Pepper + buttertop 21% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together85,593 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Venison + peppertop 28% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together955 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).