Venison sausages and white beans with cider, cream and mustard

 

We love this easy Lia Leendertz recipe that harnesses the rich flavours of venison and cider to perfection.

Now is the ideal time for incorporating venison into your autumn cooking, with local butchers stocked to the gills with this delicious and overlooked meat. Did you know it has more protein than any other red meat, and more iron than beef?

Many (like us), who perhaps first tried venison in a red wine stew, find the flavour a bit over-powering, but we recently came across this milder Lia Leendertz recipe in one of her annual Almanacs and couldn’t resist trying it for a weekend supper over our fire pit.

We bought the venison sausages from our favourite Hay-on-Wye butcher and used Dunkertons cider, which we of course had to sip on while cooking. 

Ingredients

50g butter

1 onion, halved and sliced

2 x 400g cans cannellini beans, drained

300ml cider

300ml double cream

1 bay leaf

2 sprigs thyme

8 venison sausages

Extra virgin olive oil, for frying

2 tsps Dijon mustard

Salt and pepper

Method:

  1. Melt the butter in a frying pan and cook the onions until soft and caramelised. 

  2. Add the beans and stir to heat through. Stir in the cider, cream, bay leaf and thyme. Bring to the boil, then reduce the heat to simmer for 30 minutes.

  3. Meanwhile, fry the sausages in oil in another pan for 15-20 minutes until browned and cooked through. 

  4. When you are ready to serve, add the mustard to the beans and season. Make a mound of beans on each plate and place the sausages on top. 

This recipe is from one of Lia Leendertz’s 'Almanacs' – we get these beautiful seasonal guides every Christmas. It’s the perfect stocking filler for the forager, cook and gardener in your life. 

 
Colin Nicholls