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Soup

Rabbit Soup a LA Heine

A rich soup made from rabbit meat and broth, finished with cream thickened with arrowroot.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Celery and carrot 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 Soup a LA Heine

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the rabbits

  1. Wash and soak the rabbits thoroughly.

  2. Place the rabbits in a soup pot and cover with cold water or veal broth.

  3. Stew gently for about 45 minutes.

  4. Remove the rabbits, take off the flesh from the backs and legs, and mince it finely.

  5. Pound the minced meat into a smooth paste and set aside.

Make the soup

  1. Return the rabbit bodies to the pot along with onions, celery, carrots, herbs, mace, peppercorns, and salt.

  2. Stew the mixture softly for about 4 hours.

  3. Strain the soup and let it settle, then pour off the clear liquid into a clean pot.

Finish and serve

  1. Gradually mix the clear soup with the pounded rabbit meat while hot to avoid lumps.

  2. Season with pounded mace and cayenne to taste.

  3. Pass the mixture through a clean sieve.

  4. Return the soup to the pot, bring to a boil, and stir in the cream mixed with arrowroot.

  5. Add salt if needed before serving.

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. Celery + carrottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,173 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Onion + carrottop 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. Celery + arrowroottop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together114 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Carrot + arrowroottop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together164 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Rabbits
Provide the main meat, which is pounded into the soup to give body and flavor.
Heavy cream
Adds richness and a smooth, velvety texture to the finished soup.
Arrowroot
Thickens the soup when stirred in with the cream and brought to a boil.
Onions
Add savory sweetness and aroma as they stew with the rabbit bodies.

The step that matters

Stirring the pounded meat into the hot soup. Adding the meat paste gradually while the soup is hot lets it disperse evenly. Adding it all at once or cold tends to form lumps that a sieve may not fully remove.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (rabbit, veal, onion, celery, carrot, cream, arrowroot):

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Turmericfits better
  3. Thymefits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against rabbit, veal, onion, celery, carrot, cream, arrowroot. 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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