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Vknison Pasty

A pastry filled with marinated venison and mutton, baked slowly.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Venison and port wine work together. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 239 recipes. Both carry 1-octen-3-ol, which smells mushroom, earthy. The science ↓

Vknison Pasty

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a slow oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the meat

  1. Rub the venison shoulder with sugar for 2-3 days.

  2. Wipe the venison shoulder clean.

  3. Marinate the mutton in rape oil, vinegar, and port for 24 hours.

  4. Cut the venison and mutton into pieces.

Assemble the pasty

  1. Layer the meat pieces with fat in a dish.

  2. Season the bottom of the dish with coarse sea salt and black pepper.

  3. Add butter to the bottom of the dish.

  4. Pack the meat tightly, ensuring it is not hollow.

  5. Boil the venison bones with mutton to make gravy.

  6. Add ½ pint of the mutton gravy to the dish.

  7. Cover the meat with butter and line the sides with a thick crust, leaving the bottom open.

Bake and finish

  1. Bake in a slow oven at 300°F (150°C) for 3-4 hours until tender.

  2. After baking, pour the remaining hot gravy into the pasty using a funnel and shake to mix.

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

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

  2. Venison + muttontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together279 recipes

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

  3. Vinegar + port winetop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together598 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-ethyl-2-methoxyphenol (smoky, clove).

  4. Port wine + buttertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,499 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  5. Vinegar + peppertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

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

What each ingredient does

Venison shoulder
Sugar-cured meat that gives the pasty its main rich, tender body after long baking.
Mutton loin
Marinated in oil, vinegar and port, it softens and adds savoury flavour to the filling.
Rape oil
Carries the marinade flavours into the mutton and keeps the meat moist.
Vinegar
Acidity in the marinade helps tenderise the mutton fibres.
Port wine
Adds sweetness and depth of flavour to the marinade.
Mutton gravy
Provides moisture so the filling stays juicy during long baking.

The step that matters

Packing the meat tightly with no hollows. Air gaps let the filling dry out or shift during the long slow bake, and loose packing leaves the meat less juicy. Tight packing with added gravy keeps the pasty moist and evenly cooked.

“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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