Why it works: Butter and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓
Curried Rabbit
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Wash each piece of rabbit in cold water and drain on a sieve.
Melt the butter in a clean stewpan over low heat.
Brown the onions and rabbit
Fry the onions in the butter until pale brown, stirring constantly.
Remove the onions and drain on kitchen paper, returning the butter to the stewpan.
Add the rabbit pieces to the stewpan and brown them on all sides for about 10 minutes.
Add the curry powder and salt to the rabbit, stirring for 5 minutes to mix well.
Simmer and finish
Stir in the onions, apple, and stock, then cover and simmer for 2 hours, shaking occasionally.
Gradually stir in the cream.
Squeeze the lemon juice through a strainer into the stewpan.
Serve the rabbit pieces on a hot dish, pouring the sauce over them.
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.
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Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together41,516 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Rabbit + creamtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together409 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).
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Rabbit + oniontop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,292 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
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Apple + lemontop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together7,551 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
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Apple + buttertop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together8,706 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Rabbit
- Provides the meat that becomes tender during the long, covered simmer.
- Butter
- Carries the curry flavour and browns the onions and rabbit for richness.
- Onions
- Soften and brown into a sweet base that thickens and flavours the sauce.
- Curry powder
- Supplies the spice aroma and flavour that defines the dish.
- Apple
- Adds natural sweetness that balances the curry spices and softens into the sauce.
- Cream
- Adds richness and a smooth, mellow texture to the finished sauce.
The step that matters
Browning the onions until pale brown. Stirring constantly keeps the onions from scorching, which would turn the sauce bitter. Gentle, even browning builds a sweet, savoury base that carries the curry flavour through the dish.
Swap the apple
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (rabbit, lemon, onion, butter, cream):
- Coconutfits better
- Avocadofits better
- Limefits better
- Applethe original
Fit is the average pairing score against rabbit, lemon, onion, butter, 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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