I’ve got one that’s very basic and delicious but I’m looking for some tried and true new ways to cook the easter bunny.
Mine:
Season cut up rabbit with salt and pepper.
Saute in butter till light brown.
In same pan add to rabbit sliced carrots and celery and whole small mushrooms.
Add garlic to taste.
Add a cup of white whine.
Cover and continue to simmer on low for about an hour.
In the last 5 minutes add half cup of sour cream or plain yoghurt (which ever you prefer).
Add some fresh mint or fresh chopped basil.
Serve with rice, pasta or mashed potatoes. Don’t forget a fresh salad.
Ooh, bunny! One of my favourites.
Although ever since we became bunny parents, my wife won’t let me cook it.
I say to her–OUR bunnies have names and personalities; THIS bunny is marinated with rosemary and garlic! Try some!
Anyhoo, I like to take the bun and bread and fry like chicken, seasoned flour, buttermilk and tobasco soak, the usual. Frying in lard really makes a difference.
Also, you can make a pseudo-stroganoff with it, if it’s in pieces-bacon, mushrooms, shallots, brown bunny, deglaze with red wine and cognac, simmer briefly and stir in a few teaspoons of sour cream.
Since it’s really lean, you have to either cook it quickly or until it falls apart, and I don’t think it has enough of a distinctive flavour to stand up to it.
The London Times or FT had a intriguing recipe for jugged hare last week-used rabbit blood and chocolate, among other things. Meat was sort of pickled. Looked interesting, and I’ll do a Google and see if I can pick up anything.
Simple& quick, though, pan-fry or grill briefly. Wood fires give an excellent taste, especially with garlic and fresh rosemary.
Well, you can batter it[sup]1[/sup], fry it in butter for 45-60 minutes, and then make milk gravy with the drippings. Or, you can take a whole rabbit, stuff it[sup]2[/sup], and roast it a moderate oven (about 1½ hours). Or, for a recipe that everyone’s heard of…
HASSENPFEFFER[ul]
[li]1 rabbit, cut into serving portions[/li][li]1½ tsp. salt[/li][li]¼ cup butter[/li][li]1 onion[/li][li]4 cloves[/li][li]1½ cups port or red wine[/li][li]1 Tbsp. lemon juice[/li][li]12 peppercorns[/li][li]Bouquet garni[/li][li]3 cups hot stock[/li][li]2 Tbsp. melted butter[/li][li]1 Tbsp. butter[/ul][/li]Rinse and dry rabbit; rub salt in to flesh. Brown in butter. Place in casserole, add onion, cloves, half of wine, lemon juice, peppercorns, bouquet garni, and stock. Cook covered at 350°F for 2½-3 hours. Thirty minutes before it is done, mixed melted butter, stir into liquid, and add remaining wine. Remove rabbit to serving dish, strain gravy over rabbit, and serve with currant jelly.
[sup]1[/sup][sub]i.e. dip serving-sized pieces in a batter of egg yolks, milk, and flour, not punch it until it bleeds[/sub]
[sup]2[/sup][sub]Let’s not go there[/sub]
In fact, that’s what we thought it was until our French friend who had made the dish (a kind of bisque with whole legs in it) pointed out with a grin that there had been 4 drumsticks and no wings.
But the revelation just ruined the evening and I had to wonder why she just hadn’t used chicken in the first place.
Am I the only one who’s never heard of cooking rabbits on Easter? I’m thinking Fatal Attraction here, and it’s creeping me out. ::Running to my bunny’s cage::
Don’t worry Mr Bunny, I won’t let the mean dopers get you…
REINDEER POT ROAST
[ul]
[li]2-3 lbs. reindeer meat[/li][li]½ lb. salt pork[/li][li]Flour, salt and black pepper[/li][li]1½ cups water[/li][li]1 tsp. salt[/li][li]1 bay leaf[/li][li]4 carrots[/li][li]4 white turnips[/li][li]4 potatoes[/li][li]6 white boiling onions[/li][/ul]
Wipe meat with damp cloth, and lard with 3 oz. of salt pork. Rub with flour, salt, and black pepper. Fry remaining salt pork in kettle and brown meat in rendered fat. Remove meat and brown 2 Tbsp. flour in kettle. Put low rack in kettle, set meat on rack, add water and seasonings, cover kettle and simmer almost tender. Peel vegetables and place them around and over meat, and cook under vegetables are tender. Thicken gravy (if necessary) and serve meat, vegetables, and gravy. Add dumplings 15 minutes before vegetables are done, in desired.
This is fricasse from a collection of recipes c. 1490 and just to be a pain, I will render it in its original form which leaves the translation up to you - and just for the record I dislike rabbit - hopping or stewing. (A hint:Old English often used y the represent th)
“Take a hare…wipe [it] within, cut [it] in pieces and break [its] bones with a pestle yn put halfe a pound of butter into ye frying pan, and fry it until it be brown, yn put in ye hare & give it a walme or two. yn put in halfe a pint of …water well seasoned with pepper and salt, & a little after put in a handfull of parsley, & time, & an ounion shred all small. fry all these together till they be enough, & when it is ready to be dished up, put into ye ye yolks of [2 or 3] eggs, well beaten and mixed wth a little wine vinegar or juice of leamons. stir these well togetherlest it curdle, yn dish it up without any more frying.”
Yes this is the way things were spelled - it was rather free form.
I have a prejudice against eating rabbit since breaking a tooth on a shot. [rant] If you (the cooks at the place I ate it) are going to be serving wild rabbits instead of domestic ones, the LEAST you could do is warn us so I could have been chewing with my incisors instead of my molars! [/rant]
Boy, you can tell when somebody hasn’t actually OWNED rabbits. Lemme clue ya in, kiddo. Thumper was not a realistic rabbit. They have a personality closer to Bugs Bunny: evil, pure evil.
What sort of an unsporting bugger uses a shotgun on rabbits? You don’t shoot 'em on the run, you sneak up and pop 'em with a .22 or a pellet gun while they’re sitting around looking rodently. Don’t use those fast little .177 pellets, either; they go too fast to make a good hole. Use .22 pellets and a German airgun if you can get it.
Hassepfeffer is good, but usually we just soak in vinegar for a couple of days and use in place of chicken.
Rabbits taken this year: 64
$$ spent on meat at supermarket: $ 0.
Times stopped by cops while hunting in park: 1
Times escaping arrest by having a really creative cover story to tell: 1
