Rabbit: The Aftermath

The rabbit dinner worked out a treat, despite a few complications due to the size, or lack of size, of my oven.

I wanted to serve the rabbit with oven roasted, herbed potatoes, but couldn't fit the roaster and the potatoes in at the same time, so had to settle for simmering the rabbit over two flames of my hob rather than just sticking it in the oven.

But from the beginning:


The recipe called for the rabbit to be marinated for a couple of hours before cooking. So this morning, I took the jointed rabbit out of the fridge and set about preparing the marinade. For this I needed the following:
1 whole rabbit
1 organic lemon
1 organic orange (I used blood orange as I couldn't get any other organic ones)
1/2 pack fresh thyme
1/2 pack fresh oregano
1 sprig rosemary
1 sprig sage
2 garlic cloves

First I washed the lemon and orange under warm water, and then grated off maybe half the zest separately, making sure not to go down to the white parts, and setting the orange zest aside for later. Then I squeezed the juice out of both fruit. The herbs also got a quick rinse and then chopped up finely and mixed into the citrus juice together with the lemon zest. The garlic I peeled and cut into thin slices, then added to the marinade. This was then poured over the rabbit pieces and put back into the fridge to marinate for a couple of hours.

After a couple of hours I took the rabbit out of the fridge so it could get back to room temperature before cooking. I heated some olive oil (about 4 tablespoons) in the roaster and first browned the meat in several portions on a high heat, the set it aside.

Next I turned the heat down and added 2 roughly chopped onions and a teaspoon of fennel seeds to the roaster, frying them briefly. Then I added about 250ml of dry white win and 400g tinned and chopped tomatoes. Brought this up to a simmer, then added salt, pepper and a pinch of sugar for seasoning. The recipe suggests adding some olives as well (about two tablespoons), but I don't like them so left them out.

Once the sauce has come up to a simmer and is seasoned, the meat can go back in. Pop on the lid and leave to simmer on a low heat for around 45 minutes until the meat is done. Just before serving, add the reserved orange zest and check the seasoning.


For the roast potatoes, I kept things simple. I used 1kg of new season potato, just washed, skin on and cut into wedges. Mixed in a large roasting tin with enough olive oil to coat, some sea salt and the left over herbs from the rabbit. I roast these in the oven at 180°C (fan-assisted/convection oven) for about 45 minutes total, covering the tin firmly with aluminium foil for the first half hour to cook them, then taking the foil off to brown for another 15 minutes or so.

The rabbit cooked up very tender and juicy, but the amount of work involved in preparing it makes this definitely a special occasion dish and not something for everyday cooking. Part of the problem was dealing with a whole rabbit, even though the butcher at the market had jointed it into slightly more manageable pieces for me. Maybe next time I'll stick with just thighs instead of a whole rabbit.

Edit: I was too tired last night to tell you where I got the recipe from: It's in Meat Basics by Cornelia Schinharl (don't let the title fool you, it's a German book with an English title).