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Venison Pasty
Venison pasty is generally made of the portions of venison which do not roast very well, such as the neck, breast, and shoulders, though even the neck is more generally roasted. The pasty should properly contain venison only. When game and forcemeat are introduced, it is known no more as venison pasty, but as game pie. Wash the venison in vinegar, sprinkle a little sugar upon it, and hang it in a cool, airy situation for ten days, or a fortnight in favourable weather. It should not hang too long, and should be examined night and morning and dried with a cloth. When it is to be used, sponge it over with lukewarm water, and dry it with a soft cloth. Bone it, trim away all the skin, and cut it into pieces two inches square. Line a baking-dish entirely with good stiff pastry. Put in the pieces of meat, fat and lean together. If there is not sufficient fat belonging to the venison, a thin slice of the firm fat of a loin or neck of mutton may be put in with each piece of lean venison. Season the meat with pepper and salt only, put half a pound of butter over it, and pour in a quarter of a pint of stock or water. Cover the dish with thick pastry, ornament the top, make an opening in the centre, and lay a sheet of letter-paper over it. Bake in a moderately-heated oven. Whilst it is being baked, put the bones and trimmings of the venison into a stewpan with a pinch of powdered mace, a little pepper and salt, and three pints of water. Simmer the gravy till it is strong and pleasantly flavoured and reduced to less than half the quantity. Strain it, let it cool, and remove the fat. When the pie is done enough, beat with the gravy a tea-spoonful of lemon-juice and a glassful of port. Pour it into the pie, by means of a pointed strainer, through the hole in the centre, incline the dish a little to each side that the gravy may penetrate to all parts, and serve hot or cold. Time to bake the pasty, two hours to three hours and a half, according to size. If the under-crust is omitted, the pie will not need to bake so long. Unless the pastry is thick it will be burnt up before the meat is done enough. Many cooks partially stew the venison before putting it into the pie. Probable cost of venison, very uncertain.
A large raised-crust game pie in the old style, built on a cut of venison that would be tough if roasted. Two things decide whether it works: the pastry must be thick enough to survive three hours in the oven, and the reduced bone gravy goes in after baking, not before.
- Skip the fortnight of hangingThe ten-day to two-week hang in "a cool, airy situation" assumes a genuinely cold larder in cold weather, daily inspection, and a cook who could judge when meat had gone over. Buy venison already aged by a butcher or game dealer, or age it yourself under refrigeration at 34-40F; do not hang meat at room temperature.
- Oven temperatureA "moderately-heated oven" is conventionally reckoned at somewhere around 325-350F, held steady for the full two to three and a half hours. The sheet of letter-paper laid over the top is a shield against scorching, and baking parchment or loose foil does the same job.
- The measuresA quarter of a pint of stock is 5 imperial fluid ounces, a generous half cup. Three pints of water for the bone gravy is British imperial, about 60 imperial fl oz or roughly 7 US cups, reduced to under half. "A glassful" of port is genuinely vague in this period; a wineglass was commonly reckoned at about 2 fl oz, and that quantity suits the finished gravy.
- Half a pound of butterEight ounces of butter is a lot even for a pasty of this size, and it reflects how lean farmed and wild venison is. Two to four ounces is plenty if you have also added fat with each piece of lean, which the recipe recommends.
- Fat for the leanMutton fat from the loin or neck is not something a supermarket will sell you. Pork back fat, unsmoked fatty bacon or beef suet all serve the same purpose, which is to keep the venison from drying to string over a three-hour bake.
- Take the hint about pre-stewingThe closing line, that many cooks partially stew the venison first, is the most useful sentence in the entry. Neck, breast and shoulder are collagen-heavy; braising them until nearly tender before they go under the crust gives a far better result than trusting the oven to do everything at once.
- Crust thicknessThe warning is literal. A thin shortcrust will colour and set long before the meat is done. Use a stiff hot-water or suet-based paste rolled thick, and if you omit the bottom crust reduce the time accordingly.
- Getting the gravy inThe "pointed strainer" is a small funnel. Pour the strained, defatted, port-and-lemon gravy in slowly through the central hole while the pie is still hot so it draws into the meat, then tilt the dish as directed.
- YieldThe recipe gives no weight of venison and no dish size, so no serving count can be taken from it; it does direct that the pasty be served hot or cold.
Venison pasty is one of the oldest set pieces of English cookery, and for centuries it was a dish that money could not straightforwardly buy: deer were the property of parks and forests, and venison circulated as a gift between landowners rather than through butchers' shops. By the time Cassell's was written the trade in venison was legal, the prohibition on selling it having been lifted by the Game Act of 1831, so the book's admission that the cost is "very uncertain" may owe as much to the variability of price as to any older habit of gift-giving. Samuel Pepys records serving venison pasties to guests and frets in his diary over whether they came out well, a fair measure of the dish's status as a way of displaying a haunch someone had been generous enough to send you. The insistence here that a true pasty contains venison and nothing else, and becomes a mere game pie the moment forcemeat or other birds appear, is the late-Victorian codifying instinct at work, drawing a firm line through what had long been a looser tradition. The thick crust itself descends from the medieval "coffin," originally a stiff paste that acted as a baking vessel and a keeping-case for the meat inside, and which is often said, though the point is disputed, to have been edible more by courtesy than by intention.