Rabbit in Mustard Sauce

tigerduck's Note:

I came across this delicious rabbit recipe in the French section of a cook book about Mediterranean cooking. As my mother always pairs rabbit with mashed potatoes - which is also highly recommended with this recipe - I doubled the sauce. Who doesn't want extra sauce for the mashed potatoes? This has also the advantage that the dish can easily be reheated. I usually thin sauces with a little bit of water, wine, cream or milk if I reheat them. When I cooked this recipe, I reheated it several times, as it was only me who ate it and it always tasted delicious. You can of course halve the sauce if you are not as partial to sauces as I am. I also changed the recipe found in the book slightly in that I rubbed the pieces of rabbit in mustard before frying them. My mother always does it this way. For me rabbit cooked like in this recipe with plenty of mashed potatoes on the side is pure comfort food. I also recommend to serve some cooked carrots or steamed tomatoes with it. Yummy.

• Total Time: 1 hrs 50 mins
• Prep Time: 20 mins
• Cook Time: 1 hrs 30 mins

Ingredients:

Servings: 4

rabbit

• 1 5⁄8; kg rabbit , pieces (with bones, 3lbs 9oz)
• salt
• pepper , freshly ground
• 2 tablespoons mild mustard
• olive oil

mustard sauce

• 4 medium onions , roughly chopped
• 6 slices bacon , thin slices, sliced into 3 cm pieces (1 1/5 inch pieces)
• 4 tablespoons flour
• 3 cups chicken stock
• 1 cup white wine
• 2 teaspoons fresh thyme leaves
• 1 cup single cream (if the single cream in your country works well in sauces, otherwise use cream)
• 3 -4 tablespoons Dijon mustard
• thyme (to garnish)

Directions:

1. As indicated in the introduction I have doubled the sauce of the original recipe. You may therefore halve it if you are not as partial to sauce as I am.
2. Preheat oven 180°C / 355°F / gas 2.
3. Remove any visible fat from the rabbit meat. Rinse rabbit meat under cold water and drain well with kitchen paper.
4. Brush pieces with mustard, but do not use too much of it, as it otherwise will burn during the frying process. Generously salt and pepper the meat.
5. Fry the meat pieces in portions in hot olive oil in an oven-safe pot until they have a nice colour. Use more oil if necessary. Put browned meat aside.
6. Fry onions and bacon in the pot you fried the rabbit for 5 minutes, stirring frequently. Sprinkle with flour and stir. Add wine and stock and bring to a boil while you keep stirring. Add meat and thyme leaves.
7. Cover with a lid and cook in the oven for 75-90 minutes or until tender. Remove pot from oven and put on stove. Add cream and 3 tablespoons of Dijon mustard. Mix and check if you want to add another tablespoon. Season to taste. Cook for a few minutes on the stove until the sauce is creamy.
8. Serve on individual plates with mashed potatoes and vegetable of your choice. Garnish meat with thyme sprigs or thyme leaves.

Reviews

[sharleneb]

Amazing. I hydridized by both coating the rabbit with dijon and dredging it (do be careful not to burn while browning). Used course stone-ground mustard for the sauce. Invest the time in making a good stock for this recipe...I had some frozen duck stock on hand (sick tradition of having a "mother stock" that we add to over time, haven't killed anyone yet, it culminates on Thanksgiving). Added extra fresh thyme and served with mashed potatoes with crumbled bacon and chives. Really, heavenly. For those squeamish about rabbit, it would also work with bone in, skin-on chicken thighs.

[foodymoody]

Great recipe! First time making it. The sauce was tasty, you can definitely taste the wine in the sauce. The only thing I did extra is added 2 cups of fried mushrooms into the sauce with meat. I felt that the mushrooms gave it more flavor and added more texture to the dish. Oven time was 60 min. Rabbit turned out tender. Thank you!

[JustJanS]

I made a half recipe tonight for two of us. I'm guessing my wild rabbit was around 2lbs and I had heaps of sauce to smother our mashed potatoes in. I avoid flour thickened sauces so used low sodium chicken stock then after removing the cooked rabbit pieces, reduced the juices until they were a nice thick consistency. Then I added in the cream and mustard and returned the rabbit to that for a few minutes. My rabbit was cooked perfectly after 50 minutes as it wasn't quite as large as you used. I had to use dried thyme as I couldn't get fresh. I'll try it again with fresh as I love the stuff. I also used duck fat in place of the olive oil-I think that added to the luxury taste of the dish. This is one of the best rabbits I have ever cooked-if you didn't know your rabbit from chicken, you'd have thought it was chicken it was so tender.