Ethel Barrymore
RABBIT SAUTÉ Have a rabbit cut in pieces. Put meat and a few small onions in a saucepan with a little hot butter and lard. Sprinkle with a scant tablespoon flour.
Have ready a large glassful of white wine which has been put in a separate saucepan and allow to simmer for two or three minutes. Pour wine over the rabbit and add a bouquet of parsley, thyme and bay leaf.
Add water if necessary. Cook slowly over a low flame for about one hour.
A plain French-style rabbit fricassée: brown, flour, deglaze with wine, simmer with herbs. The stray "VANILLA WAFERS" at the head is a printer's holdover from the entry above it and has nothing to do with the dish.
- The hinge: don't let it boilRabbit is very lean and turns stringy the moment the liquid rolls. Keep the pot at a bare shiver for the full hour, lid on, and the meat stays intact on the bone.
- Buying the rabbitA whole farmed rabbit runs about 2.5-3 lb. It may come whole or already jointed into six or eight pieces: two front legs, two hind legs, saddle in two or three sections; the recipe's "have a rabbit cut in pieces" assumes the butcher or the cook does this. Wild rabbit is leaner and gamier and will likely want longer than the hour given.
- "A large glassful" of wineRead this as a generous cup, 8-10 fl oz. A dry white with some acid — Sauvignon Blanc, Muscadet, a dry Chenin — suits the herbs better than anything oaked.
- Why the wine is simmered separatelyA few minutes off to the side drives off some of the raw alcohol before the wine hits the meat. Deglazing the pan directly with the wine does much the same job and captures the browned bits as well.
- Butter and lard togetherThe lard raises the smoke point so the butter can brown the meat without burning; a tablespoon of each is enough. Neutral oil plus butter works the same way.
- The scant tablespoon of flourThat is the whole thickener. Sprinkle it over the browned meat and onions and let it cook a minute in the fat before the liquid goes in, or the sauce tastes pasty.
- "A bouquet"A bouquet garni: several parsley stems, two or three thyme sprigs and one bay leaf tied with string so it lifts out whole at the end.
- OnionsSmall onions means pearl or boiling onions, peeled and left whole; the recipe says only "a few." They cook down to sweetness over the hour and are part of the dish, not seasoning.
- Yield and servingOne rabbit feeds three to four. Egg noodles, boiled potatoes or plain rice take the sauce; season with salt and pepper at the end, since the liquid reduces.
This comes from Celebrated Actor Folks' Cookeries (1916), Mabel Rowland's collection of dishes solicited from stage performers of the day, Ethel Barrymore among the best known of them. The recipe is essentially lapin saut", a its shorthand " "a bouquet," "a large glassful" " assumes a reader who already knows the method and needs only the proportions. Rabbit was ordinary meat in 1916, sold at butchers alongside poultry, and it appears with no apology or explanation in cookbooks of the period.