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Roast Rabbit

A rabbit stuffed with bacon, breadcrumbs, herbs, anchovies, and lemon rind, roasted and served with gravy and currant jelly.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 16 ingredients
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Why it works: Thyme and marjoram match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,225 recipes. Both carry terpineol, which smells pine, woody. The science ↓

Roast Rabbit

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Remove the backbone from the rabbit for easier carving.

  2. Line the body with thin slices of fat bacon.

  3. In a bowl, mix bread crumbs, lemon rind, anchovies, parsley, thyme, marjoram, salt, nutmeg, and cayenne.

  4. Add butter, egg yolks, and cream to the mixture to form a light forcemeat.

  5. Stuff the rabbit with the forcemeat and truss it like a hare.

  6. Fasten a slice of fat bacon along the back of the rabbit and dredge it with flour.

Roast and serve

  1. Roast the rabbit before a clear, brisk fire, basting constantly with butter or lard for about 1 hour.

  2. Serve with good brown gravy and currant jelly on the side.

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. Thyme + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: terpineol (pine, woody).

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

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  3. Parsley + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,979 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  4. Lemon + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,037 recipes

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

  5. Lemon + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together957 recipes

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

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, carrying the stuffing and cooking as the meat for the roast.
Bread crumbs
Bulk the forcemeat, absorbing the butter and cream to give a light, moist stuffing.
Egg yolks
Bind the forcemeat together and add richness and a tender set.
Butter
Adds fat and moisture to the forcemeat and, when basted, promotes browning and a juicy surface.
Fat bacon
Lines and covers the rabbit, basting the lean meat with melting fat as it roasts.
Anchovies
Add a savoury depth to the forcemeat that enriches the flavour of the meat.

The step that matters

Basting constantly during the roast. Rabbit is very lean and dries out quickly over heat. Frequent basting with fat keeps the surface moist and helps it brown evenly.

Swap the nutmeg

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (rabbit, bread, lemon, parsley, thyme, marjoram, pepper):

  1. Winter savoryfits better
  2. Sagefits better
  3. Tarragonfits better
  4. Nutmegthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against rabbit, bread, lemon, parsley, thyme, marjoram, 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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