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Rabbit a la Bordelaise
Cut a rabbit into joints, cover with vinegar, chop finely two small onions, thyme, pepper, and salt, and a little grated nutmeg; let all soak for twenty-four hours.
Take out the joints and brown gently in a little dripping; when all are nicely browned take one cupful of the marmalade and stew till tender one and a half to two hours. When ready, strain off the sauce, thicken nicely with flour, dish the rabbit, and pour over the sauce.
A plain civet-style braise: a long vinegar marinade, a gentle browning, then a slow stew in the marinade itself. One word in the text is almost certainly a printer's or translator's slip, and it matters.
- "Marmalade" means marinade"Marmalade" probably means marinade -- the cupful called for at the stewing stage most likely refers to the strained vinegar-and-onion liquid the rabbit has been sitting in, rather than fruit preserve. If so, the French marinade has gone astray somewhere between the Belgian cook and the English page, though the text as printed gives no way of proving it.
- Straight vinegar is aggressiveTwenty-four hours in undiluted vinegar will pale and firm the meat considerably. Game marinades in the French tradition are commonly built on wine with only a proportion of vinegar, so cutting the vinegar with red wine or water is worth considering; the book gives no guidance either way.
- Marinate coldA full day at room temperature is how this was done in a cool larder. Do it in the refrigerator, in a non-reactive bowl -- glass, ceramic or stainless, never bare aluminium or cast iron, which the vinegar will pit and discolour.
- DrippingBeef or pork dripping, the standard household fat of the period. Lard, bacon fat or a neutral oil all work; butter alone will burn at the browning stage.
- Dry the joints before browningMeat straight from an acid marinade is wet and will steam rather than colour. Pat it thoroughly dry and brown in batches, or the sauce will have no depth.
- Timing depends on the animalOne and a half to two hours suits a wild or mature rabbit. Farmed rabbit, which is what most butchers sell now, is tender in 45 minutes to an hour at a bare simmer; push it further and it goes dry and stringy rather than falling apart.
- Thickening the sauce"thicken nicely with flour" leaves the method open; a beurre manié (equal weight soft butter and flour worked to a paste, whisked into the simmering strained liquid in small pieces) is one reliable way to do it. Taste before serving; if the marinade was strong the sauce may need a knob of butter or a spoonful of redcurrant jelly to round off the sharpness.
- YieldA whole rabbit of 2.5 to 3 lb serves four, cut into two forelegs, two hind legs and the saddle in two or three pieces. Boiled or mashed potatoes suit it, though the recipe suggests no accompaniment.
The Belgian Cook Book was assembled in Britain during the First World War from recipes given by Belgian refugees, and it reads like it: dictated dishes, sometimes at one remove through a translator, with the occasional word going astray -- "marmalade" for marinade here being a fair example. Rabbit was the everyday meat of the Flemish and Walloon countryside, cheap, kept in hutches behind the house, and long-marinated in vinegar or beer both to tenderise older animals and to keep them a few days longer without ice. The "à la Bordelaise" label is loose; in French classical cookery it points to a red wine and shallot sauce, and its appearance on a Belgian household stew suggests a cook reaching for a familiar French name rather than a strict formula. Belgium's own version of this dish, rabbit stewed with onions in beer and prunes, sits close by in the same tradition of sweet-sour braised game.