Skip to main content
Main

Ragout of Rabbit

A rabbit ragout made with rabbit pieces, flour, onions, and water, simmered for 1.5 hours.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

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 ↓

Ragout of Rabbit

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the rabbit

  1. Cut the rabbit into joints, wash, and dry it well.

  2. Mix flour, salt, and pepper on a plate, then dip the rabbit pieces in the mixture.

Brown and make the sauce

  1. Melt the fat in a saucepan and fry the rabbit until golden brown.

  2. Remove the rabbit and add the remaining seasoned flour to the saucepan, letting it brown.

  3. Pour in the water and stir over heat until it boils, adding more seasoning if necessary.

Simmer and serve

  1. Add the rabbit and onions, then simmer gently for 1.5 hours.

  2. Serve on a hot dish with toast 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. 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. Rabbit + flourtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetaldehyde (pungent, ethereal).

  4. Flour + oniontop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together32,460 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  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
Forms the main body of the dish and becomes tender during the long gentle simmer.
Flour
Coats the rabbit and browns in the fat, then thickens the liquid into a sauce.
Fat
Carries the frying so the rabbit browns evenly and the flour can toast in it.
Onions
Soften during the simmer and add sweetness and body to the sauce.

The step that matters

Browning the flour in the fat. Letting the flour cook until golden before adding water removes its raw taste and gives the sauce colour and a richer flavour. Adding water too soon leaves the sauce pale and floury.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Arrowrootfits better
  3. Turnipfits better
  4. Onionthe original

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

Rabbit PattiesRabbit Patties6 recipesTomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipesBrown BreadBrown Bread461 recipesMutton BrothMutton Broth292 recipes