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Haunch of Venison

A roasted haunch of venison cooked with butter, claret, water, flour, salt, and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Haunch of Venison

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Roast the venison

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

  2. Cover the venison with greased kitchen paper and secure with twine.

  3. Place in a roasting pan and distribute 2 ounces of butter on top.

  4. Roast for 1 hour, basting occasionally with melted butter.

  5. After 1 hour, remove the paper and rub the remaining butter over the meat.

  6. Pour in half of the claret and roast for an additional 45 minutes, basting constantly.

Make the gravy

  1. Transfer the venison to a hot platter and skim the gravy from the pan.

  2. Stir the flour into the gravy, scraping up any brown bits from the pan.

  3. Add the remaining water and claret, season with salt and pepper, and bring to a boil.

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. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Venison + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together957 recipes

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

  3. Flour + peppertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together50,459 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

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

  5. Venison + peppertop 28% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together955 recipes

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

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Venison
Is the main cut of meat that is roasted and carved, forming the dish's centre.
Butter
Adds fat that keeps the meat moist and helps the surface brown during roasting.
Claret
Adds acidity and flavour to the pan juices, which become the base of the gravy.
Flour
Thickens the pan juices into a gravy as it cooks with the fat and liquid.

The step that matters

Basting during the roast. Regular basting with melted butter and pan juices keeps the surface moist and encourages even browning. Letting the meat dry out would toughen it and leave the drippings too thin to make a good gravy.

“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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