Recipes

From British Regional Food by Mark Hix. The rich haggis stuffing in this venison recipe offers another way of serving this traditional Scottish Burns Night dish.

Serves 4

    4 trimmed venison saddle fillets, or under-fillets, each about 150g
    ½ glass good red wine
    6 juniper berries, crushed
    A few sprigs of thyme, chopped
    Salt and freshly ground black pepper
    500g neeps (swedes or turnips) peeled and roughly chopped, plus the leaves, if available, destalked and roughly chopped
    90g butter
    150ml beef stock (or ¼ good-quality stock cube dissolved in that amount of hot water)
    A little cornflour (optional)
    Vegetable oil, for frying
    150-200g good-quality haggis, skinned and meat crumbled or spooned into pieces

Method

The day before, put the venison fillets to marinate in a non-reactive dish with the wine, juniper and thyme. Cover with clingfilm and place in the fridge overnight. Next day, remove the venison from the marinade, pat the fillets dry on kitchen paper and season with salt and pepper.

To make the bashed neeps, cover the swedes or turnips with water and season with salt and pepper. Bring to the boil and simmer gently for 10-15 minutes until they are soft enough to mash. Drain in a colander, then coarsely mash with a potato masher. Adjust the seasoning, if necessary and stir in 60g of butter. While the neeps are cooking, cook the leaves in a separate pan of boiling salted water until just tender. Drain and toss in with the neeps. Keep warm.

Also while the neeps are cooking, put the marinade in a saucepan and boil rapidly until it has reduced to a tablespoon. Add the stock and any juices from the raw venison and boil for about 5 minutes or so until the sauce has thickened. If the sauce is not thick enough, dissolve a little cornflour in some water and stir it in, a little at a time, until it thickens. Strain it through a fine-meshed sieve and whisk in the remaining butter.

Heat a little oil in a heavy frying pan and cook the fillets for 2-3 minutes on each side for medium-rare or a few minutes longer for medium. Let them rest on a plate to catch the juices, covered with foil to keep them warm. Reheat the bashed neeps with the haggis folded in and spoon into the centre of each plate. Slice each venison fillet into 4 or 5 pieces and arrange on the neep mixture, then pour the sauce around.

Visit our Burns Night feature for more the lowdown on haggis, whisky and all things Scottish.