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To Jug Hare

A hare cooked in a jug with bacon, herbs, onions, bay leaves, lemon rind, and water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Beef and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,092 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

To Jug Hare

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a slow oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Season the hare pieces and place them in a jugging can.

  2. Add bacon or hashed beef, herbs, onions, bay leaves, lemon rind, and water.

  3. Cover the jugging can tightly to keep the steam in.

Cook

  1. Place the jugging can in a kettle of boiling water or a slow oven at 300°F (150°C) for 3 hours.

Finish and serve

  1. After cooking, skim off the fat and strain the gravy.

  2. Thicken the gravy and adjust seasonings if necessary.

  3. Serve the hare pieces with the hot sauce poured over them.

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. Beef + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

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

  2. Clove + lemontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,150 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Onion + clovetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together16,901 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).

  4. Beef + clovetop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  5. Onion + lemontop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,646 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Hare
Provides the main meat, which becomes tender through long, gentle moist cooking.
Bacon or hashed beef
Adds fat and savoury meaty flavour that enriches the gravy as it cooks.
Onions
Release sweetness and body into the liquid, flavouring the gravy during the long cook.
Lemon rind
Adds bright aromatic oils that lightly lift the rich, gamey flavour of the meat.

The step that matters

Keep the jugging can tightly covered. A tight seal traps steam so the hare cooks gently in its own moisture. If steam escapes, the liquid can evaporate and the meat may dry out during the three-hour cook.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, onion, clove):

  1. Avocadofits better
  2. Limefits better
  3. Coconutfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, onion, clove. 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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