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Stewed Shoulder of Venison

A slow‑cooked venison shoulder stewed with spices, mutton fat, stock, and a wine‑flavored gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and allspice match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,395 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Stewed Shoulder of Venison

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the meat

  1. Remove the bone from the shoulder of venison.

  2. Season the meat with cayenne, coarse sea salt, pounded mace, and allspice.

  3. Lay thin slices of mutton fat over the seasoned meat.

  4. Roll and bind the meat tightly.

Stew

  1. Place it in a vessel nearly its size and cover it with good stock.

  2. Stew slowly for 3 to 4 hours, turning it halfway through.

Serve

  1. Serve with gravy thickened with rice flour and mixed with claret or port wine, seasoned to taste.

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

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Mace + allspicetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  3. Pepper + beeftop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,971 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  4. Mutton + beeftop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,373 recipes

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

  5. Beef + ricetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,265 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Shoulder of venison
Is the main cut of meat that becomes tender during slow stewing.
Thin slices of fat from well-fed mutton
Bastes the lean venison with fat as it cooks, adding moisture and richness.
Good stock (equal parts beef and mutton)
Provides the cooking liquid that gently braises the meat and forms the base of the gravy.
Rice flour
Thickens the gravy so it coats the meat and sits well on the plate.
Claret or port wine
Adds acidity and depth of flavour to the finished gravy.

The step that matters

Stew slowly and turn the meat. Gentle, long simmering breaks down the tough connective tissue in shoulder so it becomes tender rather than dry. Turning halfway helps the meat cook and braise evenly in the stock.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (venison, pepper, allspice, mutton, beef, rice, flour):

  1. Turmericfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Marjoramfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against venison, pepper, allspice, mutton, beef, rice, 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.

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