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Venison Ham

A dried, cured venison ham seasoned with sugar, salt, and optional saltpetre, then smoked or air‑dried.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Venison and ham work together. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 85 recipes. Both carry 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline, which smells popcorn, roasted. The science ↓

Venison Ham

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the ham

  1. Trim the venison ham into a good shape.

  2. Rub the ham with a mixture of sugar and salt in equal parts.

  3. If using, mix 2 ounces of finely rolled saltpetre with the sugar and salt to improve color.

  4. Repeat the rubbing process every other day for eight to ten days.

Dry and finish

  1. While the ham is still moist, dust it with clean, sweet wheat bran.

  2. Smoke or dry the ham as preferred; drying without smoke is more wholesome.

  3. Serve the dried venison raw, cut into very thin pieces across the grain.

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 + hamtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

  2. Venison + wheattop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together36 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

  3. Sugar + wheattop 27% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,071 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  4. Ham + wheattop 29% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together28 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

  5. Ham + sugartop 33% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,084 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

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

What each ingredient does

Venison ham
Is the main meat that is cured, dried and sliced thinly for serving.
Sugar
Mixed with the salt in equal parts to flavour the cure and soften the salt's harshness.
Coarse sea salt
Draws moisture out of the meat, which helps preserve it during curing and drying.
Saltpetre
Helps the cured meat keep a pleasing pink colour; optional in this recipe.

The step that matters

Repeating the rub every other day for eight to ten days. Salt and sugar must penetrate evenly through the thick ham. Skipping or shortening the rubbing leaves uneven curing, so the centre can stay under-cured and spoil during drying.

“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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