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Jugged Hare

A stew of hare pieces simmered with spices, stock, and port, thickened with flour and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 18 ingredients
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Why it works: Allspice and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,874 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Jugged Hare

Ingredients

Directions

Braise the hare

  1. In a stewpot, combine hare pieces and trimmings with bacon fat.

  2. Add allspice, mace, whole pepper, garlic, onions, bay leaves, parsley, thyme, and savory.

  3. Pour in veal stock and red port; simmer until three-quarters cooked.

  4. Remove hare pieces and strain the liquid into another stewpan.

Finish the sauce and serve

  1. Add flour and butter to thicken the sauce; cook until tender.

  2. Skim off fat, season with cayenne, salt, and lemon juice.

  3. Serve in a deep dish.

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. Allspice + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Parsley + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  3. Allspice + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,077 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  4. Garlic + oniontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together29,058 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

  5. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Hare
Provides the meat that becomes tender during slow simmering in the stock.
Bacon fat
Carries the aromatics' flavour and adds richness to the braising pot.
Veal stock
Forms the liquid base that cooks the meat and becomes the sauce.
Red port
Adds sweetness and depth to the sauce as it reduces with the stock.
Flour
Thickens the strained liquid into a smooth, body-rich sauce.
Butter
Adds fat and a silky finish to the thickened sauce.

The step that matters

Thickening the strained sauce. Flour must be cooked long enough in the hot liquid to lose its raw taste and thicken fully. Adding it to a boiling sauce without whisking can cause lumps, so stir well while it cooks.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (allspice, pepper, clove, garlic, onion, parsley, thyme):

  1. Marjoramfits better
  2. Winter savoryfits better
  3. Sagefits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against allspice, pepper, clove, garlic, onion, parsley, thyme. 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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