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Hash, Stew, Oh Jug

A stew hash made with hare, gravy, and seasonings.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 20 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 ↓

Hash, Stew, Oh Jug

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderately slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Soak the hare joints in shalot vinegar with bay leaves and pounded cloves for several hours.

  2. Prepare good gravy by boiling meat trimmings, hare parts, onions, ham or bacon, carrots, sweet herbs, and peppercorns together.

  3. Season the hare joints with salt, cayenne, and nutmeg.

  4. Place the seasoned hare joints in a stew pan.

  5. Strain the prepared gravy.

  6. Strain the vinegar.

Stew

  1. Pour the strained gravy and vinegar over the hare joints.

  2. Stew gently for 3 to 5 hours until the hare is tender.

Finish the gravy

  1. Thicken the gravy with butter rolled in flour.

  2. Add chopped liver to the gravy.

  3. Stir in port wine, catsup, anchovy, or any other flavoring as desired.

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. Nutmeg + flourtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Port wine + vinegartop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together598 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-ethyl-2-methoxyphenol (smoky, clove).

  4. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Liver + anchovytop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together199 recipes

    Shared aroma: hexanol (green, fruity).

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

Cold hare
Provides the meat that becomes tender during long, gentle stewing.
Butter
Enriches the gravy and adds richness to the thickened sauce.
Flour
Thickens the gravy when rolled with butter, giving body to the sauce.
Liver
Adds depth and a rich, savory flavor to the gravy.
Port wine
Adds sweetness and aromatic depth to the finished gravy.
Shalot vinegar
Acidity tenderises the hare during soaking and adds a sharp note.

The step that matters

Stewing the hare gently for 3 to 5 hours. Low, slow heat breaks down connective tissue in the tough hare meat, making it tender. Boiling hard would toughen the meat and dry it out.

Swap the nutmeg

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, butter, flour, liver, port wine, anchovy, vinegar):

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Capersfits better
  3. Thymefits better
  4. Nutmegthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, butter, flour, liver, port wine, anchovy, vinegar. 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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