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Fricassee Rabbit

A rabbit dish simmered in milk and cream with rice.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 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 ↓

Fricassee Rabbit

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the rabbit

  1. Season the rabbit quarters with salt, pepper, and flour.

Make the gravy

  1. In a frying pan, heat butter or oil and fry the rabbit until golden brown.

  2. Add the chopped onion and parsley to the pan.

  3. Pour in the milk and cream, then return the rabbit to the pan.

  4. Cover and simmer for 30 minutes.

Serve

  1. Cook the rice separately until dry.

  2. Serve the rabbit and gravy in the center of a dish, with rice arranged around 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. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

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

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

  4. Onion + parsleytop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

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

  5. Pepper + oniontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

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 becomes tender during slow simmering in the liquid.
Flour
Coats the rabbit so it browns in the fat and helps thicken the gravy.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the gravy, giving it a mild, creamy body.
Cream
Adds fat and richness, making the gravy smoother and more velvety.
Onion
Adds savory sweetness and aroma as it softens in the pan.
Rice
Serves as a starchy side that soaks up the gravy.

The step that matters

Frying the rabbit until golden brown. Browning the floured rabbit in hot fat creates flavor through the Maillard reaction. Pale, under-browned pieces give a flat-tasting gravy, while over-high heat can scorch the flour before the meat is cooked.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Leekfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against rabbit, pepper, flour, butter, parsley, milk, cream. 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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