Why it works: Pepper and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,047 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓
Fried Rabbit
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Boil the rabbit in water for 10 minutes, then drain and let it cool.
Cut the rabbit into joints.
Fry
Dip each joint into beaten egg, then coat with bread crumbs, seasoning with salt and pepper.
Fry the joints in a mixture of butter and sweet lard over medium heat until browned on both sides.
Make the sauce and serve
Remove the rabbit and thicken the remaining fat with flour.
Stir in the milk or cream and bring to a boil.
Pour the sauce over the rabbit and serve hot, garnished with sliced lemon.
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.
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Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together27,047 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
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Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together27,232 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Butter + milktop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Bread + milktop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together11,466 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).
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Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Butter and flour 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 meat that is cooked through and browned in the coating.
- Eggs
- Bind the bread crumbs to the rabbit joints so the coating adheres during frying.
- Bread crumbs
- Form a crisp, browned coating on the outside of the joints.
- Flour
- Thickens the leftover frying fat into the base of the sauce.
- Milk or cream
- Adds liquid and richness to the sauce, which thickens as it heats.
- Butter and sweet lard
- Fat for frying that browns the coated joints and adds flavor.
The step that matters
Fry the joints over medium heat until browned on both sides. Medium heat lets the coating brown and the meat cook through without scorching the bread crumbs or the fat. Frying too hot can burn the coating before the interior is done.
“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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