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Fried Rabbit

A rabbit cut into joints, floured, fried in dripping, then served with butter, shallot, and mushroom ketchup.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Shallot and mushroom are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,982 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Fried Rabbit

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut the rabbit into neat joints and flour them well.

Fry the rabbit

  1. Heat the dripping in a frying pan until boiling.

  2. Add the rabbit and fry until nicely browned.

Serve

  1. Prepare a hot dish and add the butter, shallot, and ketchup.

  2. Arrange the rabbit on the dish and serve immediately.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Shallot + mushroomtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,982 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  2. Flour + shallottop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,081 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Butter + mushroomtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,525 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  4. Rabbit + shallottop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together157 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  5. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Rabbit
Provides the main meat, which becomes tender and savoury when fried.
Flour
Coats the joints so they brown evenly and form a crisp surface.
Dripping
Fat for frying that conducts heat and browns the flour coating.
Butter
Adds richness and a rounded flavour to the finished dish.
Mushroom ketchup
Adds deep, savoury umami flavour to the sauce.

The step that matters

Fry the rabbit until nicely browned. The dripping must be hot enough to brown the floured surface quickly. Frying in fat that is too cool lets the coating absorb grease and turn soggy, while overcrowding the pan drops the temperature and steams the meat instead of browning it.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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