Venison Wellington – Easy and Elegant!

Venison Wellington is an easy, gourmet meal that will impress your guests! It’s made with store bought phyllo sheets, so it comes together in 20 minutes!

“Wellington” is a term that refers to, traditionally, beef tenderloin wrapped in puff pastry. It is usually enclosed in the pastry, but first topped with pâté, often of foie gras, and a duxelles, or a sautéed mushroom mixture.

Now a days, it seems to be most popular in the US, many top chef’s have their own versions on their menus. The list of variations is unending, each having there own spin on this classic dish!

In this version is a fun twist on beef wellington, we have chosen to use a horseradish sauce and some simple sautéed onions and spinach. It is so delicious and is sure to impress your guests!

Ingredients you need

• Venison backstrap
• kosher or sea salt
• black pepper
• phyllo sheets or use puff pastry
• cooking spray
• onion or shallot
• cloves garlic
• fresh spinach
• horseradish sauce (recipe below) we use this instead of the more traditional dijon mustard.
• unsalted butter

For Horseradish Sauce

• prepared horseradish
• mayonnaise
• white wine vinegar
• Sugar
• salt and pepper

How to Make Venison Wellington

1. We had the inner venison tenderloin, or petit filet, so we just tied that up with the backstrap with kitchen twine.
2. Sear the loin over high heat in a large frying pan.
3. Chop onions and mince garlic.
4. Lightly brown the onions in the same pan you used to brown the meat over medium heat.
5. Add garlic when onions are golden brown. Cook for a couple minutes.
6. Add spinach to pan, turning constantly just to wilt spinach.

1. Remove from heat.
2. Spray non stick spray between 6-8 layers of phyllo dough (or use puff pastry). You want to layer the ingredients. Spread spinach mixture in the center of the pastry. Use store bought, or homemade horseradish sauce and top spinach mixture with sauce.
3. Place loin on top of spinach mixture.
4. Wrap phyllo dough like a package, overlap edges. Spray the outside with non stick spray, or brush the outside of the wellington with melted butter.

Place wellington seam side down on a parchment paper lined baking tray. Bake for 20-30 minutes in a 400°F oven until pastry is golden and crispy, and meat is done to your liking.

Variations of this recipe

Optional duxelles recipe

• Place mushrooms, thin slices prosciutto ham, fresh thyme leaves, onions or shallots in the bowl of a food processor. Pulse until fairly fine.
• Sauté mushroom mixture in a large skillet for 8-10 minutes, until most of the moisture disappears. You will end up with a paste-like mixture.
• Assemble the wellington as above but add the mushroom mixture in the middle of the pastry and then the spinach. Place meat in the center. and fold package style. Tuck the seams of the pastry or phyllo alternating each other and pressing down to seal.

Optional sauce for serving on the side

You can make a delicious sauce for this roast with redcurrant jelly, juniper berries, fresh herbs, like, thyme, rosemary and parsley, beef stock or venison stock, salt and pepper.

Add the ingredients to the pan that you browned the venison in and scrape up the browned bits. Reduce by half. Add brandy or red wine and then reduce by half again.

Strain out juniper berries before serving.

How Long to Cook Venison Wellington

The amount of time that you need to cook your wellington will be solely determined by the size of your loin. This was about 1.5 pounds and it took 25 minutes. It is crucial to have a meat thermometer to temp your meat!

For rare, you want to remove the Wellington at about 120°F. Then it is imperative to let it rest for at least 10 minutes! For medium rare you can cook it to 130°F. You never want to cook venison backstrap to over medium rare. There is not enough fat in the meat!

Can you freeze venison wellington?

Yes, you can freeze this Venison Wellington for about 2 months, uncooked. The texture of the phyllo dough may suffer a bit though. Wrap in layers of plastic wrap. Then vacuum pack or pack in large plastic bags. Remove as much air as you can.

To bake the Wellington, let thaw partially, wrapped in the refrigerator, only for a few hours. Brush with fresh butter. Bake approximately the same amount of time, but check the internal temperature in the thickest part of the meat. If pastry is getting too brown, cover with aluminum foil.

Should you use puff pastry or phyllo dough?

You can use puff pastry sheets or phyllo dough for this Venison Wellington. They will have a different texture, the phyllo sheets being flakier and crunchier and the puffed pastry being soft and flaky. The only difference will be, instead of using butter to baste, you will use a beaten egg wash for puffed pastry.

Other delicious venison recipes

• Venison Stew
• Venison Burger
• Venison Shanks
• Venison with Blackberry Sauce
• Venison Soup
• Chicken Fried Venison

For more Venison Recipes ideas, see here!

Tools I use

Contains affiliate links, for full disclosure, see FTC Disclosure, here.

• baking sheet
• meat thermometer

This venison wellington recipe is delicious deer recipe is to serve for perfect Christmas or any special dinner to impress your friends and family.

Want to learn more about How to Cook Venison? Don’t miss our awesome, Ultimate Guide! Complete with 65 FREE Recipes from some of the top venison recipe developers in the world!

Connect with us through our social media ages! Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Twitter.

If you have any questions or comments, please ask in comment section below. We’d love to hear from you!

I hope you enjoyed the recipe today!

Enjoy. And have fun cooking!

Originally published November 19,2019. Updated October 1, 2022.

Want to learn more about How to Cook Venison? Don’t miss our awesome, Ultimate Guide! Complete with 65 FREE Recipes from some of the top venison recipe developers in the world!

This post may contain affiliate links, which means I get a small commission if you go to the link and purchase something, at no additional cost to you. See FTC Disclosure, here.