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Fricasseed Rabbits

A rabbit stew with cayenne pepper, parsley, butter‑flour roux, cream, and nutmeg.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 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 ↓

Fricasseed Rabbits

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the rabbit

  1. In a stewpan, combine the rabbit pieces with cayenne pepper, salt, and chopped parsley.

  2. Pour in warm water or veal broth and simmer over low heat until the rabbit is tender.

  3. When the rabbit is half done, add the butter rolled in flour.

Finish and serve

  1. Just before serving, stir in the thick cream and grated nutmeg, being careful not to let it boil.

  2. Transfer the rabbit to a hot dish and pour the gravy over it.

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. Parsley + nutmegtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,062 recipes

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

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

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

  4. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  5. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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, becoming tender as it simmers slowly in liquid.
Butter rolled in flour
Flour thickens the cooking liquid into a gravy while the butter adds richness.
Thick cream
Adds fat and body, giving the gravy a smooth, rich texture.
Warm water or veal broth
Forms the simmering liquid that cooks the rabbit and becomes the base of the gravy.

The step that matters

Stirring in the cream without boiling. Cream can curdle or separate when it boils, which would leave the gravy grainy and broken. Adding it just before serving and keeping it below a boil keeps the sauce smooth.

Swap the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (rabbit, pepper, veal, butter, flour, cream, nutmeg):

  1. Parsleythe original
  2. Tarragonfits about as well
  3. Sagefits about as well
  4. Cinnamonfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against rabbit, pepper, veal, butter, flour, cream, nutmeg. 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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