Grilled Venison Steak with Béarnaise Sauce Recipe
A mouthwatering grilled Venison Steak with Béarnaise Sauce is one of our favorite venison steak recipes. It's a show-stopping dish that is perfect when you want to feed family and friends a beautiful venison steak dinner.
Servings: 4 people
Ingredients
VENISON STEAK
- 4 6-ounce venison steaks, about 1 ½-inches thick (bottom round, top round, or backstrap)
- kosher salt
- freshly ground black pepper
- olive oil
BEARNAISE SAUCE
- 2 Tablespoons white wine vinegar
- 2 Tablespoons minced yellow onion
- 2 sprigs tarragon, leaves stripped and roughly chopped
- 2 egg yolks
- 3 Tablespoons water
- 1 Tablespoon vegetable oil
- ⅛ teaspoon kosher salt
- 2 Tablespoons butter, room temperature
Instructions
Grilled Venison Steak
- Place the venison steak on a cutting board and tenderize using a Jaccard meat tenderizer.
- Pat the venison steak dry with paper towels, season both sides of the steak generously with kosher salt and black pepper, and drizzle all over with olive oil. Then let the steak sit at room temperature for about 15 minutes.
- Meanwhile, get your grill hot and ready for direct cooking at medium heat, 350-400 degrees. Clean the grates.
- Place the venison steak on the grill and cook leaving the grill cover open. Don't walk away! You need to keep a careful eye on the steak and flip it over every minute, keeping it over direct heat. This will allow the steak to cook thoroughly without burning.
- Cook until an instant read meat thermometer inserted in thickest portion of meat registers 130 degrees F (for medium-rare). Every grill is different, but for mine it usually takes about 6 minutes.
- Transfer steak to a cutting board and let rest for 10 minutes before slicing against the grain.
Bearnaise Sauce
- Add white wine vinegar, diced yellow onion, and tarragon to a small saucepan over medium-low heat until the onions are sweated and the liquid has reduced by about half. Remove from heat and let it cool to room temperature.
- Add the egg yolks, water, vegetable oil, and salt into the saucepan with the reduced white wine vinegar, and heat over a medium-low heat while whisking constantly. The goal here is to whisk the eggs to a custard-like consistency, which should take around 3 minutes. Once you see it start to steam, be extra-vigilant here, because if you overcook the sauce, it’ll turn into scrambled eggs. That's great for a steak and eggs recipe, but not for steak and béarnaise sauce. I like to remove the saucepan for about 20 seconds every minute while stirring to make sure it doesn't overcook.
- When the béarnaise sauce thickens and reaches the custard-like consistency, add the butter and the remaining chopped tarragon, and whisk until the butter melts and is incorporated into the sauce. The sauce is best served right away but can hold well for about 30 minutes if you prefer to get it done before you start to grill your steaks.
- Serve béarnaise sauce in a serving bowl so everyone at the table can place a dollop or two on their steak. Serve with your favorite vegetable like corn on the cob or green beans.
