Skip to main content
Main

To Roast a Haunch of Venison

A roasted haunch of venison seasoned with pepper or ginger, coated in flour paste, and served with gravy and currant jelly.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

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 ↓

To Roast a Haunch of Venison

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the venison

  1. Wipe the venison with a soft dry cloth to remove moisture.

  2. Dust the surface with freshly ground pepper or powdered ginger.

  3. Wash the venison lightly with tepid water or damp cloths. Dry the venison.

  4. Cover the fat side with a large sheet of thickly buttered paper.

  5. Make a paste of flour and water about ¾ inch thick. Spread the paste over the paper.

  6. Secure the paper and paste with twine.

Roast and baste

  1. Place the haunch over a clear fire.

  2. Baste the paper with butter or clarified dripping.

  3. Roast for 3.5 to 4.5 hours, depending on weight and quality.

  4. Remove the paste and paper 20 minutes before done.

  5. Baste the venison with butter.

  6. Lightly dredge the venison with flour.

  7. Let the venison brown lightly.

Serve

  1. Serve hot with unflavored gravy and currant jelly.

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

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

  3. Venison + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together957 recipes

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

  4. Butter + curranttop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,856 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

  5. Pepper + flourtop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together50,459 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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, cooked slowly so it stays moist and tender under the paper.
Flour
Forms the protective paste and, dusted on at the end, helps the surface brown lightly.
Butter or clarified dripping
Adds fat for basting, keeping the surface moist and promoting even browning.
Currant jelly
Provides sweetness and acidity that balance the rich, gamey flavour of the meat.

The step that matters

Remove the paste and paper 20 minutes before done. The paper and paste shield the meat while it cooks slowly. Removing them near the end lets the surface dry and brown, while leaving them on too long would keep the outside pale and soft.

Swap the currant

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

  1. Lemonfits better
  2. Red currantfits better
  3. Limefits better
  4. Currantthe original

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

You might also like

Roast VenisonRoast Venison20 recipesVenison PastyVenison Pasty7 recipesTomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipesBrown BreadBrown Bread461 recipes