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Venison Steak

Venison steak cooked with butter, pepper, salt, port wine, meat extract, and currant jelly.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Port wine and currant work together. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 356 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Venison Steak

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Heat the butter in a chafing dish.

  2. Sprinkle the steak with pepper and coarse sea salt.

  3. Cook the steak for about five minutes on each side.

  4. Add the port wine, extract of meat, and currant jelly.

  5. Cook for an additional ten minutes, then serve.

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. Port wine + curranttop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together356 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

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

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

  3. Butter + port winetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,499 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

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

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

  5. Venison + meattop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together126 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

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

What each ingredient does

Venison steak
Forms the main protein, browning on the outside while staying tender inside when cooked briefly.
Butter
Carries heat in the chafing dish and helps brown the steak surface.
Port wine
Adds acidity and fruity sweetness that reduces into the pan sauce.
Currant jelly
Melts into the sauce, adding sweetness and body to balance the wine.
Extract of meat
Adds concentrated savory depth to the pan sauce.

The step that matters

Cooking the steak for about five minutes on each side. Venison is very lean, so overcooking dries it out quickly. A brief sear on each side browns the surface while keeping the centre moist and tender.

Swap the currant

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

  1. Red currantfits better
  2. Figfits about as well
  3. Currantthe original
  4. Grapefits about as well

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