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Venison, Stewed

A slow‑cooked venison shoulder wrapped in mutton fat, simmered in port wine and stock.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and allspice match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,395 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Venison, Stewed

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the venison

  1. Hang the venison until tender.

  2. Remove the bone from the venison.

  3. Flatten the meat with a rolling pin.

  4. Soak the mutton fat in port wine for 2 to 3 hours.

  5. Place the soaked mutton fat over the flattened meat. Sprinkle the fat with allspice and pepper.

  6. Roll the meat up around the fat and tie the rolled meat securely.

Stew and serve

  1. Place the rolled meat in a stewpan with the bone, weak stock, whole allspice, black pepper, and port wine.

  2. Cover and simmer gently for 3 to 4 hours until tender.

  3. Remove the tape.

  4. Dish the meat and strain the gravy over it.

  5. Serve with red currant jelly.

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. Pepper + allspicetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,395 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Venison + port winetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together239 recipes

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

  3. Venison + muttontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together279 recipes

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

  4. Port wine + allspicetop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together400 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyl acetate (fruit).

  5. Mutton + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together5,442 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Venison shoulder
Provides the main lean meat that becomes tender during long, gentle simmering.
Mutton fat
Adds richness and moisture, basting the lean venison as it cooks.
Port wine
Adds sweetness and depth, and its acidity helps tenderise the meat.
Weak stock or gravy
Provides the liquid for simmering and forms the gravy that is strained over the meat.
Allspice
Adds warm aroma and spice flavour to the fat and the cooking liquid.

The step that matters

Simmer gently until tender. A rapid boil toughens meat and can dry it out. Gentle simmering lets connective tissue break down slowly, so the venison becomes tender and the gravy stays clear.

Swap the allspice

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (venison, mutton, port wine, pepper):

  1. Clovefits about as well
  2. Marjoramfits about as well
  3. Celeryfits about as well
  4. Allspicethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against venison, mutton, port wine, pepper. 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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