Venison saddle with sauce, dumplings, caramelized bay apples and white cabbage

Ingredients for 5 servings:

• 1 saddle of venison
• 1 bunch of thyme
• 1 small rosemary sprig(s)
• 1 bunch of sage
• ½ bunch soup vegetables
• 6 tbsp oil
• ½ tbsp coriander seeds
• 1 tsp juniper berries
• 2 allspice berries
• 1 star anise
• 125 ml balsamic vinegar
• 400 ml Game stock
• salt and pepper
• ½ tbsp beet syrup
• 1 tbsp cornstarch
• 3 tbsp apple juice
• 1 kg potatoes
• 40 g figs or dates
• 50 g semolina
• 50 g cornstarch
• 1 egg yolk
• Salt
• 40 g sugar
• 3 apples, red
• 40 g butter
• 6 tbsp orange juice
• 6 small bay leaves, fresh
• pepper
• 150 g grapes, blue, seedless
• 1 small white cabbage
• Salt
• 1 tsp juniper berries
• 60 g butter

Instructions

Working time approx. 1 hour; Rest time approx. 10 minutes; Cooking/baking time approx. 2 hours; Total time approx. 3 hours 10 minutes

from the show “The Perfect Dinner” on VOX from 11.03.2025

Skin the venison saddle, cut the fillet off the bones, and trim. Reserve the trimmings. Strip off ¾ of the thyme and rosemary, tear the sage leaves, and press the herbs onto the fillet. Then wrap the fillet in foil and chill. For the sauce base, chop the bones into pieces. Trim and roughly chop the soup vegetables. Place both in a roasting pan with the meat trimmings and drizzle with 3 tablespoons of oil. Sprinkle with the remaining thyme, coriander, juniper, allspice, and star anise. Preheat the oven to 225°C (top/bottom heat) and roast everything on the second rack from the bottom for about 40 minutes. Then place the roasting pan on a hot hob and deglaze the pan with 100 ml of balsamic vinegar. Allow to reduce almost completely, then transfer to a saucepan with the game stock and 750 ml of water. Simmer uncovered for about 45 minutes until reduced to 250 ml. Pour the stock through a fine sieve and season with salt, pepper, beetroot syrup, and balsamic vinegar. Cut the venison fillets diagonally into three pieces each, season with salt and pepper, and sear in the remaining oil on both sides. Place the pan on the second rack from the bottom of an oven preheated to 250 °C. Bring the game stock to a boil. Mix the cornstarch with the apple juice and use this to thicken the sauce. Turn off the oven. Let the fillets rest for four minutes with the door slightly ajar, then turn and let stand for another four minutes. Then slice them open. For the dumplings, place the potatoes on a baking tray and bake at 190 °C (second rack from the bottom) for about one hour. Then let them cool, peel, and press them through a potato ricer twice. Finely chop the figs or dates and knead them with the potatoes, semolina, starch, egg yolk, and salt. Dust your hands with starch, form dumplings, and place them in boiling salted water. Immediately reduce the heat and let the dumplings simmer for 15-20 minutes. For the caramelized bay apples, caramelize the sugar in a pan until golden yellow. Meanwhile, cut the apples, still with the skin, into 8 wedges and remove the cores. Melt the butter in the caramel and reduce the heat. Place the apple wedges in the caramel and fry until golden brown on one side, then turn. Add the orange juice and bay leaves and sauté the apples for two minutes. Halve the grapes and scatter over the apples just before serving. For the white cabbage rhombuses, remove the stalk from the white cabbage. Cook the cabbage in boiling salted water over low heat for about 15 minutes, until about half the leaves come off easily. Drain the leaves, halve them lengthwise, and remove the midribs. Then stack the leaves on top of each other and cut into 2cm diamonds. Finely chop the juniper berries and fry them in the butter until the butter runs clear. Then pour the mixture through a sieve into a saucepan. Sauté the cabbage leaves for about five minutes and season with salt. Charlotte prepared this recipe as a main course on the show “The Perfect Dinner” – Day 2 in Bremen on Tuesday, March 11, 2025.