Rabbit in White Wine Gravy

Rabbit is a very sensitive subject. For some odd reason they straddle the line between seasonal pet and delicious treat. If you are someone who has ever owned a pet rabbit, odds are you are going to want to skip this one. I didn't take any process photos so this is going to be a text heavy recipe, but that's okay because its pretty damned simple to make.

Rabbit, 2 1/2 - 3 pounds

8 small (1-1/2 in diameter) onions, whole

1/2 pound mushrooms, dealers choice, halved

6 small carrots, not the ones that come in the 600 packs for horses, dont eat those, those are for horses

6 sprigs of thyme

5 cloves of garlic, halved

2 cups dry white whine, I used Pomelo 2010 Sauvingon Blanc, my new favorite cooking wine

2 cups chicken stock

2 tablespoons butter

3 tablespoons flour

Salt and pepper

Olive oil

Hands down the hardest part of  cooking rabbit is finding a rabbit to cook. Specialty markets are usually able to order them for you, but in my experience they are incredibly emaciated things, all bones. There is a lovely vendor at the Davis Farmers Market that sells whole chickens and once a month she will have a few rabbits. They go fast and as far as I can tell pretty much random when the pop up, but I always grab one when I see it. Expect to pay around 8 dollars a pound, with most weighting in at around 2 and a half to 3 pounds. I had a two and a half pound rabbit and it easily fed four. I would caution you that when inviting people to eat rabbit, be very careful. While a chicken thigh with bones is a normal thing to eat, a bunny thigh, no matter how well cooked, still looks a bit like a bunny thigh. Now we have to debone the beast. 

Here is the part where Shannon usually goes for a walk with the dog. Deboning, to me, is a wonderful skill to have and brings you much closer to the food and the process. Most people don't share my secret fantasy of quitting everything, moving to Montana and becoming a butcher though. If you go the specialty market route they will probably be able to debone the rabbit for you, but always ask if they have worked with rabbit before. Its a very delicate thing and while butchers deserve your trust and respect, a busy butcher might work too quickly and loose some of the more interesting cuts in his haste. I am about to link to a video of a very talented man showing how to debone a rabbit, so far warning, here it is. I have never finished an episode of Dexter but I could watch this guy work all day. Sigh. Should have been a butcher. I'm going to take a few minutes to break down that video for those who are process junkies, everyone else feel free to skip the next paragraph.

I'm going to start by saying I have cooked three rabbits in my life and that the fellow in the video is far beyond my humble criticism. This is just the advice I would have given myself before diving into my first rabbit. In the video he is working with a very large rabbit, I'd guess between 4 and 5 pounds. At that size its okay to leave a bit of the breast meat attached to the rib cage, but when we are working on a smaller rabbit you should spend the extra five minutes to remove the ribs and the ribs only. In most videos online they quarter the rabbit first and usually ignore the breast meat, but not this guy. He deboned the whole damned thing and managed to keep everything together. Just stunning. His biggest asset is that boning knife. If you don't have a proper boning knife and think you can manage with a cleaver and a pairing knife, you are wrong. Go get a proper boning knife now before you ruin your rabbit. The first rabbit I cooked I spent probably a good hour trying to replicate what that fellow did in five minutes, but at the end I did have a complete rabbit to work with and cooked it more like a pork loin. Another recipe for another time though. With this recipe I had a bit of an audience, so I removed the spine and rib cage, then just cleaved the limbs off and halved the breasts. 

After deboning you will be left with six nice pieces of rabbit, all of which need to be salted and set aside. In a large dutch oven  heat three glugs of olive oil over medium high heat. Once that is shimmering add the onions and garlic, letting them get a bit brown and fragrant. Then add the carrots, mushrooms thyme, meat, wine, and stock. I briefly considered searing the meat first, which is an option, but that wasn't what I was going for here. The liquid should just cover the meat, if it is too much skimp on the stock, too little add extra wine. 

Bring everything to a simmer, then check the temp in five minutes. We are shooting for 160 degrees Fahrenheit. When the rabbit hits 155,  remove it from the pot, cover it in tin, and placed in the oven. Then  strain the vegetables, reserving the liquid for the sauce. Much to my guests' disgust, I threw away the soggy  miserable vegetables. I should have asked before, and you should too. If they want to eat soggy vegetables so be it, but make sure its their choice. You don't want that on your hands. 

Next melt the butter in a small sauce pan and whisk in the flour, forming a roux. Add this to the reserved liquid in a large sauce pan and reduced until a thick gravy forms. Served it over fresh noodles with poached asparagus (peel your asparagus, trust me) and fresh bread. 

If you waded through that mountain of texts thank you! Let me know if you have any questions and I do hope this has made rabbit a less intimidating meal, it really is wonderful. 

Spring Risotto

Risotto is a favorite of mine. It's prodigiously difficult to make, its only edible for about 20 minutes before it turns to muck, and more often than not it turns out mediocre. The easy way out is a box mix, but thats not what we are about here. The key to remember here is to go into this with everything prepped, a half hour to kill, and a glass of wine in your hand.

2 cups arborio rice
2 small onions, one chopped, one thinly sliced
3 cloves garlic minced
3 cups chicken stock
3 cups water
1/2 cup white wine
1 cup grated parmesan
1 1/2 cups frozen edamame
1 small head broccoli
1 cup chopped fresh spinach
4 tablespoons olive oil

Heat one tablespoon oil in a small pan over medium high heat. Add the sliced onion and a pinch of salt. Sitr frequently until caramelized, about 20 minutes. While that is happening divide the broccoli head into tiny trees until appropriately adorable. Blanch the broccoli in a small pot. In a medium pot (this dish uses a ton of pots and pans, I feel like I should tell you that now) heat the water and stock until simmering, then pull back the heat until it stops. Thaw the edamame with a splash of water in the microwave. Now we can start the risotto! See, I told you this wasn't easy, but its worth it.

In a 12 inch pan, heat the oil until shimmering over medium high heat. Add the chopped onion and stir until translucent, about four minutes. Then add the garlic and cook until fragrent, thirty or so seconds. Add the rice and stir until it smells toasty. I know how vague that sounds but trust me its pretty obivous when it happens. If you need a time frame, I'd say at most 5 minutes.

Turn the heat up a bit and deglaze the pan with the wine. Pull the heat back and add a ladle of the stock to the rice. It should just cover all of the rice. Stay close to the stove from here on out. As soon as the liquid is absorbed, add another ladle of liquid. Use a wooden spoon to scrape the bottom of the pan and mix the risotto, allowing it to cook evenly. Repeat until you hit the bottom quarter of the pot with the liquid.

At this point you need to taste the risotto frequently for consistency. I like mine just a hair's breath less done than most, but thats just me. Once it hits the ideal consistency remove from heat and add the spinach, edamame, broccoli and parmesan. You can add a touch of butter if you fancy your risotto rich but I usually don't. Mix thoroughly and serve immediately.

Shannon's Asian Sauce

I use this sauce for stir fry or lettuce wraps mostly.  These are my go to ingredients that help me make a pretty convincing Asian sauce for my tastes.

1/4 cup Soy sauce
1/4 cup Rice vinegar
1 Tbsp  - 1/2 Dijon and 1/2 whole grain Dijon
1 thumb sized piece of ginger - minced
1 large clove garlic - minced
2 tsp Sesame seed oil
1 Tbsp Sweet and Sour Thai Chili Sauce
2 tsp Siracha (or chili paste)
1 Tbsp Vegetable oil
1 tsp Brown sugar (optional for sweetness)
1 tsp fish sauce (optional)

Whisk all ingredients together.  These are approximate proportions, it is a good start but if you like more sweet or more spice add more of a certain ingredient.  Just keep tasting along the way until you find what you like.