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Jugged Rabbits

A baked rabbit dish with pickled pork, onion, herbs, and a red currant jelly gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Rabbit and pork work together. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 832 recipes. Both carry decanal, which smells soap, orange peel. The science ↓

Jugged Rabbits

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Wash and joint the rabbits.

  2. Cut the pork into slices.

Layer and cook

  1. Layer some pork at the bottom of a baking jar, followed by layers of rabbit until all the meat is used.

  2. Add the sliced onion, herbs, and peppercorns.

  3. Cover tightly.

  4. Cook in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) for two hours.

Make the gravy

  1. Remove the meat.

  2. Arrange it on a hot dish.

  3. Strain the gravy into a saucepan.

  4. Thicken the gravy with flour.

  5. Stir in the jelly when it boils.

  6. Season to taste.

Serve

  1. Pour the gravy over the rabbits.

  2. Serve.

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. Rabbit + porktop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together832 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  2. Pork + oniontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,214 recipes

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

  3. Rabbit + oniontop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,292 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

    Shared aroma: acetaldehyde (pungent, ethereal).

  5. Onion + flourtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together32,460 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Rabbits
Provide the main meat, which becomes tender during the long, covered cooking.
Pickled pork
Adds salty, savoury flavour and fat that enriches the meat and gravy.
Gravy
Supplies liquid that keeps the meat moist and forms the sauce served with it.
Flour
Thickens the gravy so it clings to the rabbit rather than running off.
Red currant jelly
Adds sweetness and a touch of acidity that balances the rich, savoury gravy.

The step that matters

Cover tightly and cook low and slow. A tight cover traps steam so the meat braises in its own juices rather than drying out. Gentle, steady heat breaks down the connective tissue in rabbit, leaving it tender.

Swap the red currant

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

  1. Avocadofits better
  2. Raisinfits better
  3. Coconutfits better
  4. Red currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against rabbit, pork, onion, 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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