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Currie of Rabbit

A stew of rabbit pieces simmered in water with onions, curry powder, salt, pepper, and oil or butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 68,474 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Currie of Rabbit

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no cooking times; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare

  1. Heat oil or butter in a pot over medium heat.

  2. Add chopped onions and sauté until golden brown.

  3. Stir in curry powder and cook for 1 minute.

  4. Add rabbit pieces and brown on all sides.

Simmer

  1. Pour in water, season with salt and pepper, and bring to a boil.

  2. Reduce heat, cover, and simmer for 1 hour or until rabbit is tender.

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. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Onion + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together42,912 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Rabbit + peppertop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,334 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-pentylpyridine (fat).

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; browning and slow simmering make the meat tender and flavorful.
Onions
Sweeten and build the base flavor as they caramelize into golden brown.
Curry powder
Provides the spice blend that gives the dish its characteristic aroma and color.
Oil or butter
Carries the heat and fat that helps brown the onions and rabbit.

The step that matters

Brown the rabbit on all sides. Searing the meat creates browned flavor through the Maillard reaction. Crowding the pot or skipping the sear leaves the curry tasting flat and greyish.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Capsicumfits about as well
  2. Potatofits about as well
  3. Mustardfits about as well
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against rabbit, pepper, butter. 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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