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Venison — or Hurrun Ka Kabob

Roasted venison haunch served with gravy, currant jelly, and port wine.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Currant and port wine work together. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 356 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Venison — or Hurrun Ka Kabob

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Wash the venison haunch in lukewarm water.

  2. Dry the venison haunch with a cloth.

  3. Cover the haunch with buttered paper.

  4. Spit the haunch for roasting.

Roast

  1. Baste the meat well while it roasts.

  2. Remove the paper from the haunch.

  3. Gently dredge the meat with flour to froth it quickly.

Finish and serve

  1. Serve the venison with its own gravy.

  2. Dress the venison with a coarse paste secured with twine.

  3. Baste the meat with butter a quarter of an hour before removing from the fire.

  4. Serve the gravy in a tureen with currant jelly, either cold or melted in port wine.

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. Currant + port winetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together356 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

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

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

  3. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Butter + port winetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,499 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

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

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

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 main meat, whose lean muscle becomes tender and juicy when roasted slowly.
Butter
Adds moisture and richness to the surface while basting, helping it brown and stay glossy.
Flour
Dusted on the meat, it helps form a light, crisp, browned crust on the surface.
Currant jelly
Adds fruity sweetness and tartness that balances the rich, gamey flavour of the meat.
Port wine
Adds sweetness and depth to the gravy, and melts the jelly into a smooth sauce.

The step that matters

Dredge gently with flour. Flour dusted onto hot meat can clump or scorch if piled on. A light, even coat browns and crisps the surface, while too much leaves a pasty, floury layer.

“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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