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Rabbit Pie

A savory rabbit pie with gravy, potatoes, and a buttery crust.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Rabbit Pie

Oven, in the book's wordsA good oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a good oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the filling

  1. Combine the rabbit pieces and water in a saucepan.

  2. Bring to a boil and skim off any scum.

  3. Add salt, pepper, parsley, onions, and cloves.

  4. Add the diced salt pork and boil until tender, ensuring the rabbits are covered with water.

  5. Thicken the mixture with browned flour and let it boil.

  6. Stir in the butter and remove from heat to cool.

Assemble and bake

  1. Prepare a buttered pudding dish by lining it with pie crust.

  2. Layer the rabbit and diced potatoes in the dish until full.

  3. Pour the gravy over the layers.

  4. Cover with a top crust.

  5. Cut a slit in the center.

  6. Bake at 400°F (200°C) for one hour, covering with paper to prevent over-browning.

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. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Pepper + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  3. Rabbit + porktop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together832 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Parsley + clovetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,768 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  5. Parsley + oniontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Rabbits
Provide the main meat, which becomes tender as it simmers in the broth.
Salt pork
Adds fat and savory flavor that enriches the gravy.
Browned flour
Thickens the liquid into a gravy that holds the filling together.
Potatoes
Add starch and bulk, soaking up gravy as the pie bakes.
Butter
Adds richness and a silky mouthfeel to the finished gravy.
Rich pie crust
Forms the structure that encloses the filling and browns in the oven.

The step that matters

Thicken the mixture with browned flour. Flour must be fully dispersed in the hot liquid and boiled so it thickens smoothly without lumps and loses its raw taste. Adding it to a liquid that is too cool or unstirred causes clumping.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (rabbit, pepper, parsley, onion, pork, flour, butter):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Garlicfits better
  3. Marjoramfits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against rabbit, pepper, parsley, onion, pork, flour, butter. 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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