members recipes

Rabbit has been a favourite dish in Italy for many centuries and can be either cooked in a pan or baked in the oven. Rabbit has a soft white flesh, similar to chicken but much more flavourful. I prefer the pan-cooking method since it has a tendency to dry up in the oven. The recipe is my own but can be modified to add different spices to suit different tastes. It can be served alone with polenta or with a side dish of cooked vegetables.

Ingredients
1 rabbit cut in pieces
flour to dredge rabbit pieces
1/4 cup olive oil
1 onion, finely chopped
1 carrot, finely chopped
1 celery stock, finely chopped
2 cloves of garlic finely chopped
1 tbsp• fresh chopped rosemary
4-5 whole cloves
chicken stock
1 cup white wine
1-2 bay leaves
salt and pepper to taste

Method
Wash and dry rabbit pieces and dredge each one in flour, shaking off excess. Heat a large saute pan over medium-high heat and when the pan is hot, add olive oil. Add one piece of rabbit at a time and brown slowly over a medium heat, turning until all sides are browned. Don\'t overcrowd the pan or it will steam instead of browning. Remove each piece on a plate when done.

Add a bit more oil to the pan if necessary, add chopped vegetables, garlic, cloves, rosemary and sauté until soft. Deglaze pan with white wine and add browned rabbit pieces, bay leaves and salt and pepper. Add one to two laddles of chicken stock at a time and cook slowly over medium-low heat, adding stock as necessary until rabbit is cooked - about 1 hour. Remove from pan and serve, spooning sauce over rabbit.