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To Roast Venison

A venison roast marinated with vinegar, spices, and claret wine, then slow‑cooked with butter and water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 20 ingredients
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Why it works: Marjoram and basil match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 688 recipes. Both carry terpineol, which smells pine, woody. The science ↓

To Roast Venison

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Wash the saddle of venison thoroughly in several waters.

  2. Rub it with vinegar, red pepper, and coarse sea salt.

  3. Coat it with strips of salt pork rolled in seasoned bread crumbs.

  4. Season with sweet marjoram, sweet basil, and pepper.

  5. Rub the whole with currant jelly and pour over claret wine.

  6. Let it marinate overnight.

Roast

  1. The next morning, cover the venison with a paste made of flour and water, half an inch thick.

  2. Cover with soft paper and secure with strings.

  3. Place in a dripping pan with claret, butter, and water, and baste often.

  4. Half an hour before serving, remove the paste and paper, baste with butter, and dredge with flour to brown.

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. Marjoram + basiltop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together688 recipes

    Shared aroma: terpineol (pine, woody).

  2. Pepper + marjoramtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,609 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Pepper + basiltop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,294 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).

  4. Vinegar + winetop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,493 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

  5. Pork + marjoramtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together883 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-hexenal (green, leafy).

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

What each ingredient does

Venison saddle
Forms the main meat, which is roasted until tender and cooked through.
Currant jelly
Adds sweetness and helps the surface brown during roasting.
Claret wine
Acidity tenderises the meat during marinating and flavours the pan liquid.
Vinegar
Acidity helps tenderise the surface of the meat during the marinade.
Flour and water paste
Forms a protective crust that shields the meat from drying in the oven.
Butter
Adds fat and moisture, and helps the surface brown when basted.

The step that matters

Covering the venison with paste and paper. The flour and water paste and paper shield the meat so it roasts gently and keeps moisture in. If the coating is too thin or gaps are left, the surface can dry out and overcook.

Swap the basil

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (venison, vinegar, pepper, pork, bread, marjoram, wine):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Sagefits better
  3. Rosemaryfits better
  4. Basilthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against venison, vinegar, pepper, pork, bread, marjoram, wine. 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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