Venison Saddle

An impressive centrepiece for stylish entertaining, this joint comprises of both loins expertly boned by our butchery team and rolled neatly together. With all the characteristically wild flavours that have seen venison gain huge popularity in recent years both in the professional and domestic kitchens, this will produce a wonderful roast with relative ease.

Valentine Warner inspires:

This is a most delicious and tender cut that should always be cooked to pink or rare. Do not try to stew this cut. If cooking rare, sear the outside to a lovely brown swiftly, then roast it at 200 °C, removing or resting the meat when it's 55 °C. 58 °C for those who prefer medium. Leave for a proper rest, that it not weep onto the plate and that any run off may be returned to the sauce or jus.

Cooked gently over charcoal with dried herbs, such as sage or rosemary, then to be  eaten with olives, almonds and preserved lemons would take venison to a more Mediterranean table while roasting and serving with ceps and apples delivers pure autumn joy. Continuing into this season and chestnut risotto would do well to be crowned with such fine meat, perhaps even a braised ossobuco-style cross cut of the haunch. 

Saddle is wonderful sliced thinly then tossed in a pokey salad of watercress & horseradish or cut more thickly and laid upon toasted sourdough rubbed with garlic with salsa verde & fresh goat's curd.

Served with burnt spring greens or perhaps a Chinese-style wood ear or oyster mushroom & cucumber vinegar salad and finishing it with a very hot Szechuan pepper oil and it is delicious.

Creamed spinach & French fries are good bedfellows as is roasted chicory, burnt oranges and a simple pass over with walnut oil.

Raw venison is deliciously invigorating! For those foraging enthusiasts, try mixing it with finely chopped wild dittander, black mustard leaves or wild garlic. Young fresh ceps grated raw over the top will also deliver a wildly pleasing and clean tasting joy.

All fungi from hedgehog mushrooms and chanterelles to truffles are fabulous with venison saddle, especially if joined by a flavoursome jus and simple, super crisp duck fat roast potatoes with parsley & garlic.

A well-prepared venison Wellington can be a fiddlier approach but will certainly deliver good things especially alongside a good gravy and a celeriac & apple purée.

Cold smoked with juniper & pine salt and then sliced very thinly to be served with a soft egg & charred dressed leeks is sublime.

Good ciders should be considered as much as wine when eaten with venison.

100% wild, estate-reared venison