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Beoiled Venison

Broiled venison steak served with a butter‑flour gravy, watercress, and currant jelly.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and watercress match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 340 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Beoiled Venison

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the grill

  1. Preheat a broiler over charcoal.

  2. Grease the broiler bars with olive oil.

Cook the venison

  1. Sear the venison steak quickly on both sides, turning frequently until rare.

  2. Transfer the steak to a hot dish.

  3. Season the steak with butter, salt, and pepper.

  4. Place the dish in a 400°F (200°C) oven for a few moments.

Make the gravy and serve

  1. In a saucepan, combine the venison gravy with hot water, port or red wine, salt, pepper, and a lump of butter rolled in flour.

  2. Heat the mixture.

  3. Pour the mixture over the venison.

  4. Garnish with watercress.

  5. Serve with 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. Flour + watercresstop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together340 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Olive + watercresstop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together684 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Pepper + watercresstop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together983 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Olive + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together30,263 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Venison steak
Is the main protein; searing quickly and cooking to rare keeps it tender and juicy.
Butter rolled in flour
Flour and melted butter thicken the port or wine gravy into a smooth, glossy sauce.
Port or red wine
Adds acidity and depth of flavour to the gravy, balancing the richness of the meat.
Currant jelly
Adds sweetness and fruit acidity that cuts through the rich, gamey meat.

The step that matters

Searing the steak quickly until rare. High heat browns the surface through the Maillard reaction for flavour, while short cooking keeps the interior rare. Overcooking toughens lean venison and dries it out.

Swap the currant

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

  1. Lemonfits better
  2. Limefits better
  3. Plumfits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against venison, olive, butter, pepper, red wine, flour, watercress. 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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