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Venison Cutlets, Broiled
Take the cutlets, an inch thick, from a fine, well-hung neck of venison. Trim them neatly without depriving them of their fat. Pepper and salt them, and lay them upon the bars of a gridiron over a clear, gentle fire. Turn them every two minutes to keep in the gravy. Serve on a very hot dish with a small slice of butter under each. Send stewed mushrooms and baked potatoes to table with the chops. Time to broil the cutlets, from twenty to twenty-five minutes. Probable cost, very uncertain.
A very short set of instructions that hides one serious problem: the cooking time. Everything else translates easily to a modern grill or a ridged pan.
- The time is the trapTwenty to twenty-five minutes will turn an inch-thick venison cutlet grey and dry. Venison has almost no intramuscular fat and no collagen to speak of in the loin or neck fillet, so it wants 3-4 minutes a side over high heat and a pull at 125-130F for medium rare. Anything past 140F is liver-dry.
- "Well-hung"Victorian game was hung in the larder for a week or more, sometimes to the edge of spoilage, which both tenderised it and gave it the strong flavour the period liked. Farmed venison sold today is aged briefly under refrigeration and arrives mild; do not attempt to hang it further at home.
- GridironA hinged or flat iron grate set over coals. A charcoal grill, a gas grill or a heavy ridged cast-iron pan all do the same job. 'Clear' means a fire burnt down to embers, with no flames and no smoke from dripping fat; 'gentle' does indicate a moderate rather than a fierce heat.
- Turning to "keep in the gravy"Frequent turning does not seal juices in -- that idea has been disproved for decades -- but it does cook a lean cutlet more evenly and prevent the surface drying while the centre catches up. The instruction is worth following for the wrong reason.
- The fatDeer fat is hard, waxy and tastes tallowy when it cools, which is why butchers often trim it off. If the cutlets come lean, bard them with a thin sheet of pork fat or streaky bacon, or rub with oil, rather than leaving them bare on the bars.
- Which cutA "neck of venison" broken into inch cutlets means the rack end -- what would be sold now as venison chops or a rack. Loin medallions work the same way. Neck meat proper, off the bone, is stewing meat and will not broil.
- Butter under eachNot a garnish. The cutlets are served on a scalding dish with cold butter beneath so it melts into a pan sauce as they rest. A knob mashed with chopped parsley and a squeeze of lemon suits the meat.
- YieldAllow two cutlets a person, or one large chop. With the stewed mushrooms and baked potatoes named here it makes a full plate; a spoonful of redcurrant or rowan jelly is the usual British accompaniment.
- "Probable cost, very uncertain"'Probable cost, very uncertain' -- Cassell's gives a price for most other dishes. Venison had no settled retail price: a good deal of it moved as a gift from estates rather than over a butcher's counter, though it could be bought -- see below.
Cassell's habit of costing each dish breaks down at venison, and the blank hints at how deer meat moved in late nineteenth-century Britain. Deer were not 'game' in the strict sense of the Game Act, but they were covered by separate deer-stealing legislation and deer in enclosed parks were the landowner's property; a good deal of venison seems to have reached middle-class kitchens as a present from an estate rather than as a butcher's purchase, which may be why a household compiler could not quote a figure. That would also fit the assumption that the cook has a whole 'fine, well-hung neck' to cut down, and the direction to hang it first. The stewed mushrooms and baked potatoes are a conventional plain accompaniment to game of the period. Farmed and imported venison, now sold by the chop in supermarkets, has made the dish easy to buy and the recipe's note about cost obsolete.