Why it works: Onion and rice are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,433 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓
Curry of Canned Rabbit or Chicken
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Open the tin of rabbit carefully.
Heat the butter or clarified fat in a stewpan.
Peel and slice the onions.
Dry the rabbit pieces with a cloth and sprinkle with flour.
Mix the curry powder with a little cold water to form a smooth paste.
Brown and simmer
Fry the onions in the hot fat until browned, stirring occasionally.
Remove the onions with a perforated spoon and set aside.
Fry the floured rabbit pieces in the stewpan until browned on all sides.
Add the chopped apple and fried onions to the stewpan with the rabbit.
Stir in the curry paste, then add the cold water or stock and salt to taste.
Stir to combine, cover the stewpan, and let it simmer gently for about 15 minutes until the apple is tender.
Serve
Cook the rice according to package instructions.
Serve the curry on a hot dish with the rice.
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.
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Onion + ricetop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together10,433 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
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Rabbit + ricetop 12% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together252 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
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Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Apple + ricetop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,311 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
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Rabbit + oniontop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,292 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Rabbit
- Provides the main meat, which becomes tender during the gentle simmer.
- Flour
- Coats the rabbit so it browns well and helps thicken the sauce.
- Onions
- Browned first to build sweetness and depth of flavour in the curry.
- Curry powder
- Supplies the spice aroma and flavour that define the dish.
- Apple
- Adds mild sweetness and softens into the sauce during simmering.
- Butter or clarified fat
- Carries the frying, adds richness and helps brown the onions and rabbit.
The step that matters
Browning the floured rabbit. Floured pieces must be fried until deeply browned on all sides, since the flour toasts and forms the colour and flavour base of the sauce. Pale, under-browned pieces give a flat, starchy sauce.
Swap the apple
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (rabbit, butter, onion, flour, rice):
- Coconutfits better
- Avocadofits better
- Raisinfits better
- Applethe original
Fit is the average pairing score against rabbit, butter, onion, flour, rice. 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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