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Venison à La Mode
4 POUNDS VENSION ROAST I ONION SLICED 4 BAY LEAVES 16 CLOVES VINEGAR 2 TABLESPOONS FAT 1/4 CUP CELERY ROOT, DICED SALT 8 GINGERSNAPS 2 TABLESPOONS SUGAR Place meat, onion, bay leaves, and cloves in an earthenware dish. Cover meat halfway with vinegar and cover dish closely. Let stand 12 hours. Turn on other side and let stand 12 hours longer. Heat fat in an iron spider or Dutch oven, add celery and meat, brown nicely on all sides. Add some of the spiced vinegar, cover closely, set in the oven, and let simmer and bake until tender, about 2 or 3 hours. Add salt and cook a little longer. Take out meat, strain gravy, skim off fat, add gingersnaps which have been softened in vinegar and to which some sugar has been added. If you wish the gravy more tart, add lemon slices. Serve with potato pancakes.
A venison sauerbraten in all but name: a long vinegar cure followed by a slow braise, with crushed gingersnaps standing in for flour as the thickener. The instructions assume a cook who knows a hearth and a covered pot, so the two things worth pinning down are refrigeration and oven temperature.
- Marinate cold, not on the counterTwenty-four hours at ambient temperature would have carried less risk in an unheated pantry than it does in a heated modern kitchen, where it is not acceptable. Cure the meat in the refrigerator, in a glass, glazed earthenware or stainless container — never bare aluminium or cast iron, which the vinegar will attack.
- Oven temperatureNo number is given. A covered braise of this kind wants about 325F; at that heat a 4 lb roast should take the stated 2 to 3 hours to reach fork-tenderness.
- An iron spiderA cast-iron skillet standing on three short legs, meant to sit over coals. Any heavy cast-iron pan or Dutch oven with a tight lid does the same work.
- Vinegar and salt are unquantifiedThe recipe says only to cover the meat halfway with vinegar, and leaves the salt entirely to the cook. For a 4 lb roast that is roughly 2 to 3 cups; some cooks cut it with water, since a strong undiluted vinegar over 24 hours can leave the outer layer harsh. Salt at the end, as directed.
- Gingersnaps as thickenerModern commercial gingersnaps are likely sweeter than the hard spiced biscuit intended. Crush the eight, soften them in a little vinegar as directed, then whisk into the hot gravy off the boil and taste before adding the 2 tablespoons of sugar — you may want none of it.
- Celery rootCeleriac, sold as a knobbly brown bulb. Peel heavily; a quarter cup diced is only a small piece of one root. Ordinary celery stalk is a thinner substitute but will do.
- Cut of venisonThis method suits shoulder, neck or a whole haunch — the connective tissue is what the long acid soak and slow heat are for. A loin or backstrap will be dry and wasted here.
- YieldFour pounds of roast serves six to eight with the potato pancakes the recipe calls for.