Skip to main content
Main

Polpettes of Rabbits, a L’lTALIENNE

Polpettes of Rabbits, a L'Italiane is a rabbit meatball dish with mushrooms, parsley, shallots, Parmesan, nutmeg, Veloute sauce, egg yolks, and breadcrumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Parsley and shallot match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,737 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Polpettes of Rabbits, a L’lTALIENNE

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the filling

  1. Remove the meat from the roasted rabbits and chop it finely.

  2. In a stewpan, combine the rabbit meat, mushrooms, parsley, shallots, Parmesan, nutmeg, and Veloute sauce.

  3. Heat the mixture over low heat until well combined, then stir in the egg yolks.

  4. Spread the mixture in a square on an earthen dish, about ½ inch thick.

  5. Let the mixture cool.

Shape and fry

  1. Once cooled, cut out circular shapes using a tin cutter about 1½ inches in diameter.

  2. Bread the polpettes twice using the usual method.

  3. In a sauté pan, heat clarified butter and fry the polpettes until lightly colored over medium heat.

  4. Drain the fried polpettes on a napkin.

Serve

  1. Arrange the drained polpettes in double circular rows on a serving plate.

  2. Pour some brown Italian sauce underneath.

  3. Serve.

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. Parsley + shallottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,737 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  2. Parsley + nutmegtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,062 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Mushroom + shallottop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,982 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  4. Shallot + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,019 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Mushroom + parmesan cheesetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,199 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl 2-methylbutyrate (apple, fatty).

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

What each ingredient does

Roasted rabbits
Provides the main meat that forms the body of the polpettes.
Egg yolks
Bind the mixture and help it set firm when heated.
Parmesan cheese
Adds savory, salty flavor and helps bind the filling.
Veloute sauce
Adds moisture and creaminess so the filling stays tender.
Bread crumbs
Form a crisp, golden coating when the polpettes are fried.

The step that matters

Frying the breaded polpettes. Fry over medium heat until only lightly colored. Too much heat browns the crumb coating before the centre warms through, while too little leaves it greasy and pale.

Swap the nutmeg

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (rabbit, mushroom, parsley, shallot, parmesan cheese, sauce, egg):

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Tarragonfits better
  3. Thymefits better
  4. Nutmegthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against rabbit, mushroom, parsley, shallot, parmesan cheese, sauce, egg. 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.

You might also like

Brown BreadBrown Bread461 recipesMacaroni and CheeseMacaroni and Cheese102 recipesWhite BreadWhite Bread80 recipesBread OmeletteBread Omelette60 recipes