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Haunch of Venison

A roasted haunch of venison prepared with vinegar, butter, flour, wine, and currant jelly.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 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

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Wash the haunch with lukewarm vinegar and water, then rub it well with butter or lard.

  2. Cover the top and sides with greased foolscap paper and coat with a thick paste of flour and water.

  3. Lay a large sheet of thin wrapping paper over this, followed by another sheet of stout foolscap, and tie down with greased pack-thread.

  4. Prepare this the day before roasting.

Roast

  1. About three hours before serving, place the haunch in a dripping pan with 2 cups of boiling water.

  2. Insert another pan above to keep in the steam and ensure a good fire; leave it for an hour.

  3. Check that the paper is not scorching; wet it with hot water and a ladleful of gravy, then cover and leave for another hour and a half.

  4. Remove the papers and paste, then test the meat with a skewer; if it goes in easily, close the door and let it brown for half an hour.

  5. Baste freely four times with wine and butter, then dredge with flour and rub with butter to create a froth.

Make the gravy and serve

  1. Transfer to a hot dish, skim the gravy from the dripping pan, strain it, thicken with browned flour, and add 2 teaspoons of currant jelly, a glass of wine, pepper, and salt.

  2. Boil briefly and serve in a gravy boat.

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

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

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

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

  4. Vinegar + curranttop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together693 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

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

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

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 haunch
Is the meat itself, whose lean texture is kept moist by the paper and paste wrapping.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and helps the surface brown and form a froth while basting.
Flour
Forms the protective paste around the haunch and, browned, thickens the gravy.
Wine
Adds acidity and flavour during basting and to the gravy, helping balance the rich meat.
Currant jelly
Adds sweetness and body to the gravy, balancing its savouriness.

The step that matters

Keeping the paper wrapping intact and checking for scorching. The flour-and-water paste and paper shield the lean meat from drying and burning. Wetting the paper with hot water and gravy keeps it from scorching while the steam-rich oven cooks the meat through slowly.

Swap the currant

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

  1. Lemonfits better
  2. Grapefits better
  3. Plumfits about as well
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against venison, vinegar, butter, flour, wine, pepper. 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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