Red Meat & Pork
Red Meat & Pork
Venison steaks with garlic and rosemary
A lovely supper recipe for autumn
As the weather cools and the nights draw in, hearty dishes are what’s needed for supper, and these venison haunch steaks with a flavourful garlic and rosemary dressing are ideal. I love venison but when a friend mentioned recently that she had been served a very tough, tasteless venison steak in a local restaurant (mentioning no names…), I decided to try out a few recipe ideas myself and work out how best to keep the steaks tender and super-tasty. The simplest cooking technique turns out to be the best - sear the steak first in a hot pan, then cook briefly over a low heat and add a very simple dressing to the pan at the end. Haunch steaks are best for this recipe.
Ingredients
Serves 2
- 2 venison haunch steaks
- 1 tsp dried juniper berries, crushed
- 25g butter
- 1 garlic clove, crushed
- sprig of fresh rosemary
Method
Season the venison all over with salt, black pepper and the crushed juniper berries. Heat a non-stick frying pan until very hot, then fry the steaks quickly until brown on both sides. Reduce the heat and cook for around 5 mins more, turning once. Add the butter to the pan with the garlic and rosemary and allow to melt, spooning over the steaks regularly for another 2 mins. Remove the steaks from the pan and rest in a warm place (such as an oven at 50C) for 5 mins.
Serve with the buttery juices, along with sauté or mashed potatoes and green veg.
A Cook's Plot Tip
The recipe works well with beef steaks too. You can find dried juniper berries in the spices aisle at larger supermarkets