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Rabbit, Fillets of

Rabbit fillets larded with bacon, cooked with mirepoix and stock, finished in oven and served with brown sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Carrot and celery match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,173 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

Rabbit, Fillets of

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Prepare

  1. Remove the flesh from the back of each rabbit and cut into suitable pieces.

  2. Lard one side of each piece with bacon in close, even rows.

Cook

  1. Place the mirepoix in a stewpan and add enough stock to nearly cover the vegetables.

  2. Lay the fillets on top of the vegetables, cover with greased paper, and put on a tight lid.

  3. Cook gently for about 1 hour, adding more stock as needed.

  4. Transfer the fillets to a 400°F (200°C) oven for a few minutes to crisp the bacon.

Serve

  1. Brush the fillets with glaze and serve on a hot dish with the sauce poured around.

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. Carrot + celerytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,173 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Carrot + oniontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

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

  3. Onion + celerytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,518 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Rabbit + celerytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together240 recipes

    Shared aroma: sabinene (woody, terpenic).

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 becomes tender during slow, gentle cooking.
Larding bacon
Adds fat that bastes the lean rabbit, keeping it moist and aiding browning.
Mirepoix
Flavours the cooking stock and creates a moist, aromatic bed under the fillets.
Stock
Provides the cooking liquid that gently braises the rabbit and forms the base for flavour.
Brown sauce
Adds a rich, savoury sauce that complements the lean rabbit meat.

The step that matters

Gentle cooking with a tight lid. Cooking gently in a covered pan with enough liquid braises the lean rabbit slowly, keeping it tender and moist. Boiling or letting the liquid dry out would toughen the meat.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Turnipfits better
  2. Mustardfits better
  3. Parsnipfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against rabbit, carrot, celery, 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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