Name: Lapereaux Aux Fines Herbes
Ingredients: 2 rabbits or leverets; 2 tablespoons butter; ¼ teaspoon coarse sea salt; ¼ teaspoon black pepper; 2 tablespoons minced parsley; 1 minced shallot; ¼ cup minced mushrooms; 1 lemon

Why it works: Parsley and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,037 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Lapereaux Aux Fines Herbes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

Cut the rabbits into pieces and trim them.

Cook and serve

Place the pieces in a stew pan with butter, salt, pepper, parsley, shallot, and mushrooms.
Cook over medium heat for 15 minutes.
Squeeze lemon juice over the mixture and serve.

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.

Parsley + lemontop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together14,037 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
Parsley + shallottop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together3,737 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together34,122 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together27,047 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Shallot + mushroomtop 4% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,982 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: Provides the main meat, which becomes tender as it cooks slowly in the pan.
Butter: Adds fat for richness and helps carry the herb and savoury flavours.
Mushrooms: Release moisture and add savoury, earthy depth to the stew.
Shallot: Adds a mild, sweet aroma that builds the base flavour.
Lemon: Adds acidity that brightens the rich butter and meat flavours.

The step that matters

Cook over medium heat for 15 minutes. Rabbit is lean and dries out and toughens if overcooked. Medium heat cooks the meat gently, keeping it moist and tender while the mushrooms release their liquid into the pan.

“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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Lapereaux Aux Fines Herbes