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Mock Venison

A stew of mutton with anchovies, onions, herbs, spices, bread crust, carrot, and port wine.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and carrot are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 21,601 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Mock Venison

Ingredients

Directions

Make the stock

  1. Stew the bones with anchovies, onions, sweet herbs, white pepper, mace, bread crust, and carrot.

  2. Strain the mixture and place it in a stewpan with the fat side of the mutton facing down.

Stew and finish

  1. Add port wine and stew until the mutton is tender.

  2. Brown the mutton in a dripping pan and serve with the sauce.

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. Onion + carrottop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

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

  2. White pepper + macetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,695 recipes

    Shared aroma: myrcene (balsamic, herbaceous).

  3. Mutton + breadtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,488 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  4. Mace + carrottop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,592 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  5. Mace + port winetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together695 recipes

    Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).

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

What each ingredient does

Mutton
Provides the meat that becomes tender during slow stewing and is browned at the end.
Onions
Build savory sweetness and body in the stock as they soften and release their sugars.
Port wine
Adds sweetness, acidity and depth to the sauce as it reduces during stewing.
Carrot
Adds natural sweetness and body to the stock.
Anchovies
Dissolve into the stock to add savory depth without a fishy taste.

The step that matters

Browning the mutton in a dripping pan. Browning relies on the Maillard reaction, which needs a dry, hot surface. If the meat is crowded or wet, it steams instead, so it will not develop a rich brown crust or deep flavor.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mutton, onion, mace, bread, carrot, port wine):

  1. Marjoramfits better
  2. Clovefits better
  3. Parsleyfits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mutton, onion, mace, bread, carrot, port 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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