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A hare roasted with ale, vinegar, garlic, pepper, salt, and optionally cream or milk, finished with butter and flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,451 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity, wine. The science ↓

To Roast

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Skin and prepare the hare; wipe it well without washing.

  2. Slit it a little under the jaws to let out the blood.

  3. Stuff it with savory or sweet stuffing, sew it up, and lard or wrap it in paper.

Roast and baste

  1. In a dripping pan, combine ale, vinegar, garlic, pepper, and salt.

  2. Baste continually until the hare is dried up, or use cream or milk to baste until ready.

  3. Finish by frothing with butter and flour.

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. Clove + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  2. Garlic + peppertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,090 recipes

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

  3. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  4. Clove + garlictop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,368 recipes

    Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).

  5. Vinegar + garlictop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,115 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

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

What each ingredient does

Hare
Is the main meat that is roasted and carved, forming the body of the dish.
Ale
Adds liquid and flavour to the pan juices used for basting.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that sharpens the basting liquid and balances the rich meat.
Cream or milk
Adds moisture and richness when used to baste the hare near the end.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, and helps the final frothed coating brown.
Flour
Thickens the butter and pan liquid into a frothed coating.

The step that matters

Baste continually. Frequent basting keeps the surface moist while the lean meat cooks, so it does not dry out before it is ready.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (vinegar, garlic, pepper, cream, butter, flour):

  1. Tarragonfits better
  2. Parsleyfits better
  3. Thymefits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against vinegar, garlic, pepper, cream, butter, flour. 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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