Venetian Sauce
This is an utterly useless name; but it sometimes occurs and must be explained. It is difficult to say wherein it differs from the Poulette sauce, and we have seen that the Poulette sauce differs little from Allemande or German sauce. The Venetian may be described as an Allemande made verdant with chopped parsley-to remind one of the green slime of the lagoons.
VENISON is one of the commonest of meats in Paris ; but then it is roebuck venison, which is of small account in England. Nobody who can command Southdown or Scotch mutton in this country will ever condescend to roebuck, a leg of which has to be larded before it has any value. It is a common remark in England, indeed, that good mutton, if it can be had four or five years old, is equal and more than equal to the only venison which is prized here that of the fallow deer, cultivated in parks. Even of this fallow deer, the doe has no repute, and it is only the buck, while it is in season, from June to Michaelmas, that attracts the regard of a connoisseur. The red deer of the Scottish Highlands is, in honour of its prowess, • eaten with rejoicing by those who stalk it; but it is coarse of texture, rank of flavour, and not to be compared with the fallow deer. Let the sportsman sing- My heart's in the Highlands, my heart is not here, My heart's in the Highlands a-chasing the deer; A-chasing the deer and following the roe- My heart's in the Highlands wherever I go : but for the pleasure of the table give us neither a haunch of the red deer from Scotland, nor a Parisian mess of chevreuil-but English park venison; and for any useful purpose that is all we need consider now.
Haunch of Venison. It is one of the immutable laws of gastronomy that if a haunch (also a shoulder or a neck) of venison is not fat, it is not worth the trouble of roasting; Verjuice and if fat, all the art of the roaster is to be directed to nursing the fat. The venison is to be well kept-a fortnight at least, and when about to be cooked should be lightly sponged with warm water, and then dried with a cloth. Then lay over the fat a sheet of buttered writingpaper-which tie on and butter on the outside once more. Over this lay a paste of flour and water which has been rolled out about half an inch thick. Cover this again with two sheets of buttered paper, and tie all securely with twine. Lay the venison in a cradle-spit, before a strong, clear fire, and basting it constantly, let it roast for four hours. Twenty minutes before it is ready it must be unswathed. Baste the meat in every part with butter; sprinkle some salt on it; dredge in a little flour; and place it nearer the fire to brown and froth. Send it up to table as hot as possible, with brown gravy in a tureen, with currant jelly, and with a dish of French beans for vegetable garnish.
Venison Chops. To be done like mutton chops, but neither beaten nor trimmed of fat. Let them be peppered and salted, and turned every two minutes. They take twenty minutes to cook, and are served with a pat of butter under them. Currant jelly apart.
Venison Sauce.-Sweet: Black or red currant jelly melted in port wine. Sharp: Good brown gravy (if made of the venison itself so much the better), three gills; red wine, one gill; raspberry vinegar, half a gill.
The entry opens as a dictionary note on Venetian sauce, then drifts into three usable recipes: a roast haunch, chops, and two venison sauces. The roast is the substantial one, and it was written for a joint with a thick natural fat cap roasted before an open fire — two things a modern cook has to work around.
- The hinge: fatThe whole method exists to protect fat that today's venison does not have. Park fallow bucks carried a heavy saddle of fat; farmed and wild venison is very lean. Bard the haunch with sheets of pork back fat, caul fat or fatty bacon before you wrap it, or the flour paste will simply insulate a dry joint.
- Paper and paste"Buttered writing paper" is best replaced with buttered parchment; the half-inch flour-and-water paste is a huff paste, a sacrificial shell that steams the meat and is discarded, never eaten. Tie with butcher's twine, not synthetic string.
- Fire to ovenA cradle-spit before a strong clear fire has no exact oven equivalent; a hot oven, in the region of 400-425F, with the joint raised on a rack over a tray, is a workable stand-in. Once unswathed for the final browning, "nearer the fire" means the top of a hot oven or a few minutes under the broiler.
- Four hours is a fire time, not an oven timeIgnore the clock and use a thermometer. Lean venison is at its best pulled at 125-130F in the thickest part and rested 20 minutes; past 140F it turns dry and livery whatever you wrap it in. A boned or small haunch may need well under two hours.
- Hanging the meat"Well kept, a fortnight at least" assumed a cold larder in the shooting season. Age it uncovered on a rack in a refrigerator held at 34-38F, and only if the carcass was cleanly dressed; a fortnight at kitchen temperature is not a risk worth taking.
- GillsIn this British book a gill is a quarter of an imperial pint, 5 fl oz. Three gills of brown gravy is therefore a little under 2 cups, one gill of red wine about 2/3 cup, and half a gill of raspberry vinegar about 1/3 cup -- reduce it a little, as the vinegar is assertive. The sweet version is simply currant jelly melted into port; the author gives no proportions.
- The chopsTwenty minutes will ruin a venison chop. Loin or rack chops of ordinary thickness want 3-4 minutes a side in a hot pan to reach medium rare, then a rest; the instruction to turn them every two minutes is sound in principle and gives an even crust.
- YieldA bone-in haunch of 8-10 lb serves ten to twelve, with brown gravy served separately in a tureen, currant jelly alongside, and green beans as the only vegetable the author allows.
Kettner's Book of the Table (1877), written anonymously by the journalist E. S. Dallas around the reputation of Kettner's restaurant in Soho, is arranged as an alphabetical dictionary, which is why a note on a sauce name the author considers "utterly useless" runs straight into a lecture on deer. The snobbery about park venison has a social root: by custom venison from English deer parks was given rather than sold, so a haunch on the table announced a connection to a landed household. Roebuck, plentiful and cheap in Paris, carried no such cachet, and Highland red deer — the animal in the Burns lines quoted here, My Heart's in the Highlands — was prized for the stalking rather than the eating. The elaborate paper-and-paste wrapping is standard spit-roasting practice of the period for any large joint whose surface would otherwise scorch long before the centre was done, and it survives in the modern trick of tenting a roast with foil.