Selle de Chevreuil avec Sauces Diverses

Ingredients

Equipment Needed

• •Heavy 12-inch (30 cm) ovenproof roasting pan or skillet
• •2-quart (2-liter) heavy saucepan
• •Fine-mesh sieve
• •Instant-read thermometer
• •Butcher's twine
• •Long carving knife
• •Warm saucière or small sauceboat

Instructions

1. 1

   Choose the sauce

   Choose one sauce before beginning. Poivrade is peppery, wine-dark, and direct. Venaison softens poivrade with tart redcurrant jelly. Grand-veneur adds both cream and jelly, giving the broadest and most generous sauce. Moscovite carries cream, juniper, and sweet fortified wine. Robert stands apart with onion, white wine, and mustard. Prepare only the ingredients for your chosen path, because the selected accompaniment determines the finished dish's proper title.

2. 2

   Build the poivrade

   For Poivrade, Venaison, Grand-Veneur, or Moscovite, melt the poivrade-family butter in a heavy saucepan and brown the trimmings thoroughly. Add the diced onion, carrot, and celery, then cook until the vegetables take a deep bronze at their edges and a brown fond forms across the pan floor. Pour in the red wine vinegar and scrape well, reducing until only a glaze remains. Add the red wine and reduce by two-thirds, then add the stock, veal demi-glace, thyme, bay leaf, and parsley stems. Hold at a bare simmer for 35 minutes, skimming the surface when needed. Add the crushed peppercorns for the final 10 minutes, then strain through a fine sieve and reduce to about 1½ cups (360 ml), thick enough to nappe, or coat, the back of a spoon. If it remains thin, keep reducing. If it tightens too far, loosen it with a spoonful of stock. Ça se rattrape.

3. 3

   Build Sauce Robert

   If Robert is your choice, melt its butter over medium-low heat and cook the sliced onion with a small pinch of the measured salt until tender and properly golden, about 12 minutes. Add the white wine and reduce until the pan is nearly dry. Stir in the veal demi-glace and simmer gently for 15 minutes, then strain, pressing lightly on the onion, and return the sauce to a clean saucepan. Do not add the mustard yet. Mustard is the final seasoning and hard boiling robs it of its point.

4. 4

   Bard and roast

   Heat the oven to 450°F (230°C). Dry the saddle thoroughly, then season it with the remaining salt, ground pepper, and crushed juniper. Lay the unsmoked bacon or back fat over both loins and tie it crosswise with butcher's twine at 1½-inch (4 cm) intervals. Heat the oil in a large ovenproof pan and brown the underside and exposed ends of the saddle for 4 to 5 minutes. Turn it upright, add the roasting butter, garlic, and thyme, and baste well. Roast for 12 minutes, remove the bard and twine, baste again, then lower the oven to 400°F (200°C). Continue roasting until the thickest loin registers 128 to 130°F (53 to 54°C), usually another 10 to 18 minutes. The temperature will continue to rise as the meat rests. This saddle is lean and crosses from rosy to grey quickly, so begin checking early. If it overshoots, remove it at once, rest it properly, then carve a little thinner and serve the sauce beneath the slices. The sauce restores generosity even when it cannot reverse the heat.

   Insert the thermometer horizontally into the thickest part of one loin without touching the backbone. The bone reads hotter than the meat and gives false confidence.
5. 5

   Rest and deglaze

   Transfer the saddle to a warm platter and rest it loosely covered for 15 minutes. Set the roasting pan over medium heat, pour in the water, and scrape up every dark morsel of fond. Strain this deglazing liquid into the chosen sauce, along with any juices gathered beneath the resting saddle, then skim away excess fat. This small addition joins roast and sauce into one dish; do not discard it.

6. 6

   Finish the sauce

   For Poivrade, warm the sauce gently, take it off the heat, and whisk in the cold butter piece by piece. For Venaison, dissolve the redcurrant jelly in the warm poivrade, then whisk in the cold butter off the heat. For Grand-Veneur, whisk the cream and jelly into the poivrade and simmer only until smooth and lightly thickened. For Moscovite, warm the Malaga with the crushed juniper, cover for 10 minutes, strain it into the poivrade, then add the cream and jelly and reduce gently to a gloss. For Robert, take the hot onion and wine sauce off the heat and whisk in the Dijon mustard. Taste every sauce for salt only after its finish is added. If a cream sauce separates, remove it from the heat, whisk a spoonful of reserved cold cream in a clean pan, then incorporate the broken sauce gradually. Ça se rattrape. Once butter or mustard has gone in, keep the sauce warm without boiling.

7. 7

   Carve and serve

   Run a long knife down each side of the backbone and lift the two loins away whole. Turn each loin flat and cut it across the grain into generous slices about ½ inch (1.25 cm) thick. Arrange them on the warmed platter with their rosy centres visible, spoon a little sauce beneath them, and send the remainder in a warm saucière. Announce the dish by its sauce: Selle de Chevreuil, Sauce Poivrade; Sauce Venaison; Sauce Grand-Veneur; Sauce Moscovite; or Sauce Robert. Never drown the meat. The sauce should accompany every bite while leaving the saddle unmistakably itself. À table!

Chef Tips

• •Ask a game butcher for a small, bone-in roe deer saddle with the pelvic bones removed, the loins left on the backbone, and the useful trimmings packed separately. A larger red-deer saddle cooks less evenly and feeds far more than four; a butcher can cut the section to size.
• •Clear, tart redcurrant jelly is the correct finish for venaison and grand-veneur. Jam contains seeds and fruit pulp that cloud the sauce and turn its clean sweet-sour note into breakfast.
• •Malaga gives Sauce Moscovite its rounded sweetness. Medium Madeira is the honest home equivalent when Malaga cannot be found, though it produces a slightly drier finish.
• •Use inspected venison if you want the classical rosy centre. Whole-cut guidance may call for a finished temperature of 145°F (63°C), and wild-harvested meat follows the hunter or processor's safety advice. Temperature outranks romance.
• •Pour a mature red Burgundy or another supple Pinot Noir. The meat is delicate for game, so a heavily tannic red bullies it, especially beside the sharper Poivrade or Robert.
• •Leftover saddle keeps for up to 3 days when chilled promptly. Reheat the sauce separately and let thin slices of meat warm in it for only a minute; boiling cooked venison turns it firm.

Advance Preparation

• •The poivrade base or the Robert sauce can be prepared through straining up to 2 days ahead, chilled promptly, and reheated gently. Add butter, cream, jelly, fortified wine, or mustard only at the final service.
• •The saddle can be trimmed, seasoned, barded, and tied earlier the same day. Keep it cold, then remove it 30 minutes before roasting so the chill softens without leaving the meat standing out for long.
• •Warm the serving platter in the switched-off oven while the saddle rests. This replaces the salamander's service heat without cooking the carefully roasted centre any further.

Frequently Asked Questions

Nutrition Information

1 serving (about 315g)