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Venison Steaks

Venison steaks are pan‑fried with a wine‑flavored gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and butter 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 ↓

Venison Steaks

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the steaks

  1. Sprinkle the venison steaks with flour.

  2. Fry the steaks in hot lard or butter.

  3. Season with coarse sea salt and black pepper when half done.

  4. Turn the steaks frequently.

  5. Remove the steaks when cooked through.

Make the gravy

  1. Stir a little flour into the pan drippings.

  2. Add enough hot water to make gravy.

  3. Let the gravy boil.

  4. Pour in the wine.

  5. Pour the gravy over the steaks.

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 + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Butter + winetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,645 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

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

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

  4. Pepper + winetop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,066 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter 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 steaks
The main protein, which browns on the outside while cooking through inside.
Flour
Coats the steaks to help them brown and thickens the pan drippings into gravy.
Lard or butter
Fat for frying that conducts heat and browns the steak surface.
Wine
Adds acidity and depth of flavour to the finished gravy.

The step that matters

Remove the steaks when cooked through. Venison is very lean, so it dries out and toughens quickly once overcooked. Pulling the steaks as soon as they are cooked through keeps them tender and juicy.

“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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