Elizabeth Ist coat of arms

Red Deer Pie Old Elizabethan Recipe

Queen Elizabeth Ist

"Queen Elizabeth Ist"

To make a Red Deer Pie
Bone your Venison, and if it be a Side, then skin it, and beat it with an Iron Pestle but not too small, then lay it in Claret wine, and Vinegar, in some close thing two days and nights if it be Winter, else half so long, then drain it and dry it very well, and if lean, lard it with fat Bacon as big as your finger, season it very high with all manner of Spices and Salt,

make your Pie with Rye Flour, round and very high, then lay store of Butter in the bottom and Bay Leaves, then lay in your Venison with more Bay leaves and Butter; so close it, and make a Tunnel in the middle, and bake it as long as you do great Loaves, when it is baked, fill it up with melted Butter, and so keep it two or three months, serve it in with the Lid off, and Bay Leaves about the Dish; eat it with mustard and sugar.

Red Deer Pie Old Elizabethan Recipe
The above Old recipe is taken from for Red Deer Pie is written in totally different way to today's recipe books.

  • There were no lists of ingredients - these were included as part of the text
  • Food and ingredient measurements were extremely basic - quantities were not often specified.
  • Temperature control was difficult and therefore not specified.
  • Cooking times were vague - and left to the cook to decide.
  • It was assumed that the reader would already have some knowledge of cooking

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Elizabethan Era
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