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Barbecued Rabbit

A rabbit seasoned with salt, pepper, vinegar, mustard, and currant jelly, then grilled and finished with a glaze.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Vinegar and mustard are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,067 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Barbecued Rabbit

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the rabbit

  1. Soak the rabbit in salt water for 30 minutes.

  2. Scald the rabbit with boiling water and wipe it dry.

  3. Grease the rabbit with butter and sprinkle with pepper and a little salt.

Grill and finish

  1. Place the rabbit on a grill, turning often to cook evenly without drying out.

  2. Once browned, place on a hot dish and butter both sides generously, adding more salt and pepper.

  3. In a bowl, mix vinegar, mustard, and currant jelly or brown sugar.

  4. Pour the mixture over the rabbit, rubbing it in, then pour over gravy and serve hot.

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. Vinegar + mustardtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Pepper + mustardtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Rabbit + mustardtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together56 recipes

    Shared aroma: geraniol (rose, geranium).

  4. Vinegar + curranttop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together693 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

  5. Pepper + vinegartop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

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

What each ingredient does

Rabbit
Is the main protein, cooked over the grill until browned and tender.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, helping the surface brown and keeping the meat moist.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the sauce and balances the sweetness of the jelly or sugar.
Currant jelly or brown sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the sauce caramelize and brown on the meat.
Prepared mustard
Adds sharp, tangy flavour that complements the vinegar and sweetness.

The step that matters

Turning the rabbit often on the grill. Rabbit is very lean, so frequent turning over moderate heat cooks it evenly and helps keep it from drying out before it browns.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (rabbit, butter, pepper, vinegar, mustard):

  1. Lemonfits better
  2. Mangofits better
  3. Limefits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against rabbit, butter, pepper, vinegar, mustard. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“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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