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Rabbits and Fowls

A rabbit simmered in water and served with onion sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 3 ingredients
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Why it works: Rabbit and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,292 recipes. Both carry decanal, which smells soap, orange peel. The science ↓

Rabbits and Fowls

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Skin the rabbit and wash it well in cold water.

  2. Soak the rabbit in warm water for 15 minutes to draw out the blood.

  3. Bring the head to the side of the body and secure it with a skewer.

Cook and serve

  1. Place the rabbit in a pan and cover it completely with boiling water.

  2. Simmer until tender, about 45 to 60 minutes.

  3. Serve covered with onion sauce.

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. Rabbit + oniontop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,292 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  2. Rabbit + saucetop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together330 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Onion + saucetop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together10,474 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

Onion and sauce barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 10,474 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

Rabbit
Is the main protein; simmering in water turns its connective tissue tender.
Onion sauce
Adds moisture and savoury flavour over the cooked meat.

The step that matters

Simmer until tender. Rabbit is lean and its connective tissue needs long, gentle simmering to soften; too hot a boil can toughen the meat and leave it dry. Check for tenderness rather than relying only on the time.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (rabbit, sauce):

  1. Mustardfits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Welsh onionfits about as well
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against rabbit, sauce. 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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