Paper Palate

Yesterday’s New York Times Magazine featured an article by Randy Kennedy: “The Way We Eat: Rabbit is Rich,” that made me salivate.

For one thing, rabbit, though I have eaten it only a couple of times and cooked it only once, is one of my favorite meats of all time, so of course it got my juices going. For another thing, the article contained a wealth of recipes, including one that sounds pretty much like the unforgettable dish I ate at a tiny, very lovely little Italian restaurant in Boston (do I remember the name–no–this is why I don’t review restaurants, but I sure do remember the dish): Rabbit Ragu With Pappardelle.

Finally, it is an article obviously meant to spread the gospel on the fact that rabbit is good food that should be more widely available and eaten throughout the US. Unfortunately, it suffers from various image issues; to some it is “poor people food” right up there with raccoon and possum (raccoon is nasty; I cannot speak from personal experience on possum, but I know what they eat and it doesn’t make me want to eat them), while others simply cannot stomach the idea of eating something as cute, fluffly and cuddly as a bunny. To the latter folks, I usually point out that I have known domesticated rabbits to attack people and other animals, including dogs. They are not all cute little cuddlers, and their teeth and claws are plenty sharp enough to inflict painful wounds. I also offer as evidence that rabbits can be vicious the incident where President Jimmy Carter was attacked by a crazed rabbit who tried to climb aboard the president’s fishing boat and bite him. President Carter fought off the wicked lagomorph with a paddle, and then had pictures taken to prove that it was indeed a rabbit who jumped him. (Perhaps the wild bunny had been trained as an assassin by a terrorist organization; more likely, it had a wild hare up it’s…nevermind.)

Poverty food, cuteness and politics aside, rabbit meat is very good, and good for you. Nutritionally speaking, it is low in fat, and high in protein; a 100 gram serving is 58% protein and 12% saturated fat, and while it is most often compared to chicken, it has a fuller, more rich flavor without being gamey or tough. It is a tender, fine-textured meat that is simple to cook, though I will give my opinion that, compared with chicken, it is difficult to debone. Therefore, I suggest to all first-time cooks that not only do they keep in mind that rabbit is a low-fat meat, meaning it will dry out if you cook it too long without sufficient moisture, it is also best cooked on the bone. Bones can be removed after cooking for some preparations, while in others, such as fried rabbit, it is not only acceptable, but desirable to serve it on the bone.

The only problem that remains is how and where to find rabbit meat to cook; it is not widely available in grocery stores, though it is possible in some areas to find it in the frozen meat section. I have had good luck finding it at North Market Poultry and Game in Columbus, Ohio, but of course, that doesn’t help people anywhere else in the country. Small farmers are typically producers of good quality domestic rabbit meat; check your local farmer’s markets.

Or, use the Internet to do the searching for you, and look up rabbit meat on Local Harvest or Eat Wild, two websites that list local farmers and their products in order to get the word out to consumers on where to purchase sustainable, organically produced foods in their areas. Local Harvest lists 202 rabbit meat producers across the country.

If all else fails, you can mail order frozen rabbit from Ardeng Rabbit Meat in South Carolina. The meat itself is priced fairly, but the shipping prices are likely quite steep.

What does one do with rabbit once one has obtained it?

The New York Times article lists two classic European traditional recipes for rabbit, and one variant on Southern US fried rabbit: the afformentioned Rabbit Ragu with Pappardelle, Café des Fédérations’s Rabbit With Mustard Sauce (Lapin a la Moutarde), and Fried Milk-Brined Rabbit and Roasted Morel Salad.

In order to offer a bit more cultural variety, I’d like to add a recipe that I made from Fuchsia Dunlop’s excellent Sichuan cookbook, Land of Plenty: Rabbit with Sichuan Pepper. The addition of Sichuan peppercorn to the mild, yet rich rabbit meat is amazing, and I cannot help but think that anyone who loved authentic Chinese food would love this dish. Just be forewarned that boning out the rabbit meat is a bit time consuming, and it may be worthwhile to just leave the bones in and cut the meat into chunks, bone and all with a cleaver as the author suggested, but which I did not do.

Rabbit with Sichuan Pepper

Ingredients:

1 1/4 pound rabbit meat, deboned if you are crazy like me, and cut into 1/2 inch cubes
3 scallions, white parts only, thickly sliced on the diagonal
1/2″ cube fresh ginger, peeled and smashed with the side of a cleaver
1 tablespoon Shao Hsing wine
1 1/2 teaspoons cornstarch
2 1/2 tablespoons peanut oil
8-12 Tien Tsin dried chiles, snipped in half, with most of the seeds removed
1 teaspoon freshly ground Sichuan peppercorns
2 teaspoons dark soy sauce
1/2 teaspoon raw sugar
2 heads Shanghai bok choi, rinsed, trimmed and cut into 1″ chunks (optional)
1/2 cup chicken broth
1 teaspoon sesame oil

Method:

Toss rabbit meat with the scallions, ginger, wine and cornstarch. Allow to sit and marinate at least thirty minutes, although, I think a couple of hours is better.

Heat wok until it smokes, add peanut oil. Toss in the chiles and ground Sichuan peppercorns, and stir, frying until very fragrant–about thirty seconds (This is one of those times that if you have a vent hood, you really need to use it. The hot chile oil is nothing to play with onces it becomes aerosolized.)

Add the rabbit and the marinade–watch out for splatters from the wine. Spread out into a single layer on the bottom of the wok and allow to brown on the bottom before starting to stir fry–about forty-five seconds to a minute. Then stir fry like mad. When most of the pink is gone, add the soy sauce and sugar, and stir and fry to create a thick sauce. If any of the marinade has begun to stick to the bottom of the wok, use the soy sauce to deglaze.

Add the bok choi, if you are using it and the broth. Stir and fry until the bok choi is crisp-tender, and the sauce has reduced and clings thickly to the meat and greens.

Remove from heat and add the sesame oil and stir it in well before pouring contents of wok into a warmed serving plate.

Serve with -lots- of steamed rice; the dish is spicy! Note: The amounts on the chiles and Sichuan peppercorns can be adjusted down to the diners’ tastes. For those who are not used to such spicy fare, I would suggest using 4 whole chiles, and 1/2 teaspoon ground Sichuan peppercorns.