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Stewed Rabbit

A hearty rabbit stew with bacon, carrots, onions, and stock.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Carrot and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,555 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Stewed Rabbit

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut the rabbit into neat pieces with a sharp knife.

  2. Wash the rabbit pieces and dry them with a clean cloth.

  3. Wash and scrape the carrot, then cut it in half.

Brown and stew

  1. Fry the bacon in a saucepan over medium heat for about 6 minutes, then remove and set aside.

  2. Brown the rabbit pieces in the bacon fat, turning occasionally.

  3. Add the carrot, onion, shallot, fried bacon, flour, salt, and pepper to the saucepan with the rabbit.

  4. Pour in the stock or water, stir well, and bring to a boil.

  5. Skim the surface, then reduce heat and simmer gently for about 1 hour and 15 minutes.

Serve

  1. Serve the rabbit and bacon on a hot dish, straining the sauce over it.

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. Carrot + peppertop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,555 recipes

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

  2. Shallot + flourtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,081 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Carrot + oniontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

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

  4. Carrot + shallottop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together803 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  5. Onion + shallottop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,431 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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, becoming tender as it simmers slowly in liquid.
Bacon
Its fat browns the rabbit and adds savoury, smoky flavour to the stew.
Flour
Thickens the cooking liquid into a sauce as it combines with the stock.
Onion
Releases sweetness and aroma into the stock as it cooks slowly.
Stock
Provides the cooking liquid that carries flavour and keeps the rabbit moist.

The step that matters

Skim the surface before simmering. Skimming removes foam and loose fat that rise as the liquid heats, giving a cleaner, clearer sauce. Simmering gently rather than boiling keeps the rabbit meat tender instead of tough and stringy.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Turnipfits better
  2. Parsnipfits better
  3. Leekfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against rabbit, carrot, shallot, 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.

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