Smoked venison pizza with wild mushrooms, asparagus & taleggio

ingredients

• Smoked venison pizza with asparagus & taleggio

  • 200 gram venison loin or steak
  • 1 tablespoon olive oil
  • flour, for dusting
  • 250 gram pizza dough
  • 100 millilitre pizza sauce
  • 100 gram sliced mozzarella
  • 100 gram asparagus, thinly sliced on an angle
  • 80 gram taleggio cheese, broken into pieces

• Smoking mixture

  • 1 tablespoon peppercorns
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 4 tablespoon brown sugar
  • 2 tablespoon white rice
  • 50 gram jasmine tea leaves

• Wild mushroom mixture

  • 2 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil, plus extra for drizzling
  • 200 gram sliced wild mushrooms (oyster, baby brown/crimini and porcini) or any mushrooms of your choice
  • 1 clove garlic, thinly sliced
  • 1 teaspoon chopped fresh thyme

method

• Smoked venison pizza with wild mushrooms, asparagus & taleggio

  • 1

    Place a pizza stone on the centre rack of the oven and preheat to 250°C. Let the stone heat up for 45 minutes before using. You will need a wooden pizza paddle or a thin baking tray for transferring the pizza onto the stone.

  • 2

    Heat a non-stick frying pan until smoking hot. Place venison on a plate, drizzle with olive oil and massage all over, then season with salt and pepper. Sear venison in the pan for 1-2 minutes (depending on thickness) on each side then place on a plate to rest.

  • 3

    Put the smoking mixture in a wok lined with tinfoil and place an oiled wire rack over the mixture. Place wok over a high heat and heat for 2 minutes or until the wok starts to smoke heavily. Place venison on the oiled rack, cover wok with a lid and smoke venison for 4-5 minutes. Rest venison on a plate for 5 minutes then slice thinly against the grain.

  • 4

    For mushroom mixture, heat oil in a large non-stick frying pan over a medium-high heat. Toss mushrooms and garlic in pan and cook for 4-5 minutes or until mushrooms soften. Season with thyme, salt and pepper. Set aside to cool.

  • 5

    Lightly flour work surface and roll out pizza dough to a 30cm circle. Transfer to a lightly floured wooden pizza paddle or thin oven tray.

  • 6

    Spread the pizza sauce evenly over the base, keeping 2cm away from the edge. Scatter mozzarella on top, followed by mushroom mix and sliced asparagus. Transfer pizza to the preheated pizza stone and bake for 10-12 minutes or until pizza is crisp.

  • 7

    Remove pizza from oven with the paddle and transfer to a serving plate. Cut into squares or slices, scatter over taleggio, arrange venison on top and drizzle with extra virgin olive oil.

notes

If you don’t want to smoke the venison, just sear and rest the meat as described in the recipe. However, smoking the venison is definitely worth the effort for the amazing taste it imparts.