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Rabbit, Piquant

A rabbit seasoned with salt and pepper, fried and breaded, then baked and served with piccalilli or tartar sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Rabbit, Piquant

Oven, in the book's wordsA brisk oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a brisk oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the rabbit

  1. Skin the rabbit.

  2. Draw the rabbit.

  3. Clean the rabbit thoroughly.

  4. Cut the rabbit open lengthwise.

  5. Lay the rabbit flat on a table, skewering it to keep its shape.

  6. Sprinkle the rabbit with salt and pepper.

Fry and coat

  1. Place the rabbit in an oval pan with bacon fat or butter.

  2. Fry the rabbit until three-quarters cooked.

  3. Drain the rabbit and let it cool.

  4. Brush the rabbit with oiled butter.

  5. Coat the rabbit with egg and bread crumbs twice.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake the rabbit in a brisk oven at 400°F (200°C) until lightly browned.

  2. Serve the rabbit on a hot dish with piccalilli or tartar 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. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  2. Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  3. Butter + saucetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together15,338 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Rabbit + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,448 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

Butter and sauce barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 15,338 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
Provides the lean meat that is the main part of the dish.
Bacon fat or butter
Fat for frying that carries heat and adds richness and flavour to the meat.
Egg
Binds the bread crumbs to the rabbit so the coating holds during cooking.
Bread crumbs
Form a crisp, golden coating that browns in the oven.

The step that matters

Fry the rabbit until three-quarters cooked. Stopping at about three-quarters lets the meat finish gently in the oven. Frying it fully first would dry the meat and overcook it by the time the crumb coating browns.

“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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