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Venison En Casserole
21/½ lbs. venison 10 whole peppers 12 tiny white onions 1 clove garlic 1 tablespoonful chopped parsley I bay leaf 2 tablespoonfuls (2 ozs.) butter 1½ pints (3 cups) stock 2 heaping tablespoonfuls (2 ozs.) flour 12 mushrooms 2 pickled walnuts Salt and pepper A bunch of herbs 3 wineglassfuls port wine Cut up the venison into square pieces; put them into an earthenware jar, add the clove of garlic, bay leaf, peppers, a pinch of salt, and one glassful of the wine. Let this marinade remain for six hours.
Drain the pieces of venison and dry them. Melt the butter in a casserole, put in the venison, and fry for ten minutes; then add the flour, and mix well; add the wine and the stock, stir till it boils, draw to one side of the fire, add the herbs, the onions, peeled, salt and pepper to taste, and pickled walnuts.
Simmer for forty minutes. Ten minutes before serving add the mushrooms. Remove the herbs before serving in the casserole.
A straightforward game stew from the era when "casserole" meant the vessel — a lidded earthenware or enamelled pot set on the stove — rather than a baked dish. Most of what needs translating here is quantities and cuts.
- The garbled first quantity"21/½ lbs. venison" is a printer's or scanner's mangling of 2½ lbs. That amount balances the 3 cups of stock and 2 oz each of butter and flour, and serves four.
- WineglassfulsA wineglass in British cookery books of this period is usually reckoned at about 2 fl oz, so three glasses is roughly ¾ cup of port, one of which goes into the marinade. Some sources allow a larger glass; on that reading the dish simply comes out sweeter and more heavily fortified.
- The stock measure"1/2 pints (3 cups)" is 1½ pints. At 20 fl oz to the imperial pint that is 30 fl oz, rather more than three American cups (24 fl oz), so the book's own equivalence is approximate; 3 cups works as the practical figure. Use a good brown stock; venison in port needs body under it.
- Choose the cut, then set the timeForty minutes only works for tender cuts cut small — loin or well-trimmed leg. Shoulder, neck or shank want 1½ to 2 hours at a bare simmer before they yield. Judge by the meat, not the clock.
- Pickled walnutsGreen walnuts pickled in spiced malt vinegar, black and soft, still sold in Britain and by mail order elsewhere. They break down into the sauce and add a sour-malty depth. There is no close substitute; a spoonful of good malt vinegar plus a little anchovy gets you part way.
- "A bunch of herbs"A bouquet garni: parsley stalks and thyme, tied so it can be lifted out. (The one bay leaf listed goes into the marinade.) The tablespoon of chopped parsley is never given a use in the method; scattering it over at the end is the obvious guess.
- Draw to one side of the fireOn a range this meant moving the pot off the hottest plate to hold it just below a boil. On a modern hob, the lowest setting with the lid ajar gives the same gentle heat.
- Mushrooms at the endTen minutes is right for whole button mushrooms and keeps them firm. Brown them separately in a little butter first if you want colour in the sauce.
- Marinade safetyThe venison sits six hours in wine at room temperature in the original. Marinate it covered in the refrigerator instead, and dry the pieces thoroughly before they meet the butter or they will steam rather than brown.
Casserole cookery had a vogue in Britain and America in the years around 1900, when fireproof earthenware and glassware made it possible to bring the cooking pot straight to the table — hence the instruction to serve in the casserole. The dish itself is older than the fashion: port is well attested with venison, and the pairing with pickled walnuts and a bunch of herbs is often said to be an old English treatment, from the days when deer came from private parks rather than butchers and the meat arrived lean, dark and often not young. The pickled walnut is the period signature, a preserve made from unripe nuts gathered in midsummer before the shell hardens, and it did in an English kitchen roughly what a spoonful of vinegar or tamarind does elsewhere: cut the richness of the sauce and give sweet fortified wine something to push against.