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Rabbit Pie, Raised

A raised pie filled with seasoned rabbit, bacon, egg yolks, and tomato sauce or gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 13,015 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Rabbit Pie, Raised

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the filling

  1. Season the rabbit pieces with salt, pepper, and nutmeg.

  2. Dice the bacon and set aside.

Assemble the pie

  1. Make a raised crust and shape the pie as desired, ensuring the sides are firm.

  2. Pack the rabbit and bacon tightly into the pie, adding the egg yolks.

  3. Pour a little tomato sauce or gravy over the filling.

  4. Cover the pie with pastry, brush with egg, and decorate as desired.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake at 350°F (175°C) for about 1.5 hours, or until a skewer pierces easily.

  2. Serve hot or cold.

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 + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

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

  2. Pepper + tomatotop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

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

  3. Rabbit + nutmegtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together235 recipes

    Shared aroma: sabinene (woody, terpenic).

  4. Nutmeg + tomatotop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together879 recipes

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

  5. Nutmeg + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together24,744 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

Nutmeg and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 24,744 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 turns tender and savoury as it cooks inside the crust.
Fat bacon
Adds fat and savour that keeps the lean rabbit moist during baking.
Eggs
Hard-boiled yolks add richness and a firm, crumbly texture to the filling.
Pastry
Forms a sturdy raised case that holds the filling and browns in the oven.
Egg
Brushed on the top crust, it promotes browning and a glossy finish.

The step that matters

Ensuring the sides are firm. A raised crust must hold its shape without support while baking. If the dough is too soft or warm, the walls slump and the pie loses its form. Firm, cool dough keeps the walls standing as the filling cooks.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (rabbit, pepper, nutmeg, egg):

  1. Spinachfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Shallotfits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against rabbit, pepper, nutmeg, egg. 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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