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Venison Pie

Venison pie is a savory pastry filled with tender venison stewed in a spiced wine gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Allspice and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,874 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Venison Pie

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.

Make the filling

  1. Place the venison strips in a stew pan and cover with hot water.

  2. Add salt, pepper, allspice, cloves, and port wine.

  3. Remove any scum.

  4. Simmer slowly until the venison is tender.

  5. Replenish water as it evaporates to maintain the original quantity.

  6. Thicken the gravy with browned flour mixed with butter.

Assemble and bake

  1. Transfer the mixture to a baking dish.

  2. Cover the mixture with puff pastry.

  3. Brush the pastry with beaten egg.

  4. Bake at 400°F (200°C).

  5. If the crust browns too quickly, cover it with buttered paper.

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. Allspice + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Pepper + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  3. Pepper + allspicetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,395 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Venison + port winetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together239 recipes

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

  5. Clove + port winetop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together914 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

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

What each ingredient does

Venison
Forms the main body of the filling and becomes tender during long, slow simmering.
Browned flour
Thickens the cooking liquid into a gravy, giving the filling body.
Butter
Adds richness and fat to the thickened gravy, smoothing its flavour and mouthfeel.
Port wine
Adds sweetness and depth of flavour to the braising liquid.
Puff pastry
Forms a flaky crust that rises and browns in the oven.
Egg
Brushed on the pastry, it promotes an even golden browning on the crust.

The step that matters

Simmer slowly until the venison is tender. Venison is lean and can turn tough if cooked too fast or too hot. Slow simmering breaks down connective tissue gradually, and keeping the liquid topped up prevents the meat from drying out and the gravy from concentrating too much.

Swap the clove

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

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Parsleyfits about as well
  3. Cinnamonfits about as well
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against venison, pepper, allspice, port wine, flour, butter, egg. 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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