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Rabbit Pie

A savory pie filled with rabbit, ham, and eggs, topped with a butter‑lemon crust.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,047 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Rabbit Pie

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the rabbit and eggs

  1. Boil the eggs for 20 minutes, cool them in cold water, then shell and slice them.

  2. Soak the rabbit in tepid water to draw out the blood.

  3. Remove the heart, liver, and fat, then cut the rabbit into joints.

  4. Dry the rabbit on a towel and remove the skin from the back.

  5. Use the side bone, head, and liver to make the stock.

Assemble the pie

  1. Layer a few pieces of rabbit in the pie dish.

  2. Sprinkle with salt, pepper, and herbs.

  3. Add some ham and egg slices.

  4. Repeat with remaining rabbit, ham, seasoning, and egg.

  5. Pour in the stock.

Make and finish the crust

  1. Mix flour, butter, lemon juice, and a pinch of salt for the crust.

  2. Add enough cold water to form a stiff paste.

  3. Roll out the dough, fold it in thirds, and roll out three times.

  4. Roll the dough larger than the pie dish.

  5. Cut a band of dough for the rim.

  6. Brush the dish with egg.

  7. Place the band and cover with the rolled dough, pressing lightly.

  8. Cut the edges with a knife.

  9. Make a hole in the center.

  10. Brush around the hole with egg.

  11. Use leftover dough to decorate the pie.

  12. Brush the entire surface with egg.

Bake

  1. Bake at 400°F (200°C) for 1.5 hours, starting with the first 15 minutes at a very hot temperature.

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. Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  2. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Rabbit + flourtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetaldehyde (pungent, ethereal).

  4. Rabbit + hamtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together273 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Rabbit + lemontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together626 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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
Forms the main meat filling, becoming tender and juicy as it cooks slowly under the crust.
Eggs
Add richness and body to the filling, and the egg brush gives the crust a golden browned surface.
Hungarian flour
Forms the structure of the pastry, which holds its shape around the filling.
Butter
Adds fat that makes the crust short and flaky as it bakes.
Ham
Adds salty, savoury flavour between the layers of rabbit and egg.
Stock
Adds moisture and savoury depth to the filling, keeping the meat from drying out.

The step that matters

Start the bake at a very hot temperature. The first 15 minutes at high heat set and brown the pastry quickly, helping it hold its shape before the filling cooks through at a lower heat.

“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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