Smeared Rabbit
Take a Pipkin, a porrenger of water, two or three spoonefuls of vergis, ten Onions pilled, and if they be great quarter them, mingle as much Pepper and salte as will season them, and rub it upon the meat, if it be a rabbit: put in a peece of butter in the bellye and a peece in the broth, and a few Curans if you wil, stop your pot close and seeth it with a softe fier but no fier under the bottome, then when it is sodden serve it in upon soppes & lay a few barberries upon the dishe.
--Anonymous, The Good Hous-wives Treasurie, 1588.
2 rabbits, jointed (about 3 pound each)
5 onions
1/2 cup currants
2 cups water
6 tablespoons verjuice
1 tablespoon butter
Peel and quarter onions. Place in a large pot or dutch oven. I used a slow-cooker. Rub the rabbit with salt and pepper, and lay them on the onions. Sprinkle currants over. Add the water, verjuice and butter. Simmer on a low heat until the rabbit is cooked. On the stove top, this might only take a couple of hours. I let the rabbit cook for about 7 hours.
Line a serving bowl with slices of stale bread (soppes) and put the rabbit on top. Pick out as many bones as you can. Rabbits have lots of small ribs and vertebrae. Make sure to pour the broth over. Garnish with barberries.
Notes:
When the shopping was done, no one had rabbit, so I substituted chicken thighs. The day of, I ran out to pick up a last minute ingredient, and the supermarket had rabbit. So this was half chicken and half rabbit. I removed the skin and excess fat from the thighs. The rabbit needed to be jointed. That was fun...
I didn’t have any barberries, so I sprinkled pomegranate seeds on top for garnish.
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Copyright 2003, Abigail Weiner