To: "homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org" <homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org>
Subject: [Homestead] Rabbit
Date: Wed, 15 Mar 2006 08:29:04 -0700
The Way We Eat: Rabbit Is Rich
By RANDY KENNEDY
Published: March 12, 2006
One of my favorite scenes in the Jim Jarmusch movie "Down by Law" involves
Roberto Benigni standing in the woods, triumphantly clutching a dead rabbit
by its hind legs and trying to explain to his fellow prison escapees Tom
Waits and John Lurie that he has just procured their supper, the
old-fashioned way.
"Very difficult to catch rabbit," Benigni pants. "I run half an hour for
this rabbit.. . .Very cunning rabbit."
I have never had to chase one down for sustenance. But since I started
regularly cooking rabbit several years ago, it has felt like an epic hunt,
requiring all my cunning, to find a fresh one for sale. Even in Brooklyn,
where I live, my only reliable supplier for years was an Italian butcher in
Bensonhurst, which meant a subway ride. And on trips to see family, I might
as well have been looking for a moon rock. In St. Louis last fall, I
finally tracked down some fryers (or young rabbits) at the old Soulard
Farmer's Market, and the purveyors, whose stall also included a box of
skinned coons and a fresh beaver tail that looked like a prehistoric fish,
seemed surprised that I had actually shown up after phoning.
Of course, once you have located the rabbit, then comes the real surprise:
the price. I have never bought a fryer for much less than $20, which means
about $6 per pound, compared with $2 or maybe $3 a pound for a high-quality
chicken. It has never made sense to me. Didn't we all learn in school that
rabbits multiply like, well, rabbits? They have been farm animals since at
least the Middle Ages. So why is it that buying one feels like buying foie
gras?
The short answer is that modern Americans except maybe during World War
II, when rabbit was sold cheaply because of food shortages have never
fully accepted Oryctolagus cuniculus as food. Perhaps as a result, Congress
doesn't mandate inspection of rabbits. If they want a voluntary federal
inspection, processors must pay, which pushes prices up. And since many
stores won't carry non-U.S.D.A.-approved meat, rabbit is harder to find.
In an odd way, it suffers from a dual image problem here. Rabbit is still
seen by some as a poverty meat, not far removed from raccoon. But nowadays,
paradoxically, the meat is also seen as too haute and suspiciously
French, even in these post-freedom-fries days thumbing its nose at our
images of rabbits as pets and clever cartoon characters. (It surely didn't
help John Kerry's campaign when his wealthy wife promoted rabbit as the
healthiest meat for kids.)
But she wasn't off the mark. It is high in protein and low in fat. And
although rabbit draws the inevitable comparison to chicken because it is
white meat and the texture is similar, rabbit nearly always tastes better
to me not gamy, just richer and more interesting. Plus, it is not
intimidating to cook, even for fire-up-the-burners-and-wing-it home chefs
like me, as long as you remember that "low fat" also means "easily dried
out." Not to worry: just quickly fry off-the-bone pieces in a pan. Or even
more foolproof, brown it, toss it into a pot with some vegetables and
almost any braising liquid stock, wine, tomatoes, hard cider, even beer
and sit back while a low-temperature oven makes you an amazing meal.
In much of the country, sadly, this might be the only way you'll get to eat
it. Philippe Trosch, the chef at the Ventana Room in Tucson, complains that
he has sometimes had to drop rabbit from his menu because he can't find a
steady supply that meets his standards.
"I barely see it on California menus or in the Southwest," says Trosch, who
grew up eating it at Sunday family dinners in Biarritz, France. "A lot of
younger chefs here just don't have any idea how to cook it." With deep
culinary disappointment, the Gallic kind, he adds, "I don't understand."
Neither do I. But right about now I would really like one with a nice,
creamy mustard sauce and some thyme. I guess it's hunting season again.