Rabbit

Food, Nutrition and Agriculture
grenfell
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Joined: Thu Jul 04, 2013 7:55 pm

Rabbit

Post by grenfell »

At one time when i was living with my parents we kept rabbits and many ended up in the pot. I haven't eaten rabbit for some time and when my sister in law and my wife were talking about what to get for christmas , family dinner and all that , i threw rabbit into the conversation. A bit to my surprise they did say ok but my sil did add that she wouldn't touch it , cook it or eat it. She has since put a post on facebook about me having a rabbit for dinner and the majority of the following posts have all been negative , the " Nooooo couldn't , wouldn't eat it " type of thing. At one time it was the food of kings and lords , when i was growing up i saw it hanging in the butchers window but nowadays people seem to have gone completely off it. Go into a supermarket and the only place you're liable to see it is in tins of pet food . Baffles me.
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diamond lil
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Location: Scotland.

Re: Rabbit

Post by diamond lil »

Up here people still eat a lot of it, but the wives will say "it's for the dog"... :mrgreen:
jansman
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Re: Rabbit

Post by jansman »

I breed them mainly for meat. This time of year we will eat rabbit once a week , but most I sell on. I have a good clientele for them ( we are in the ‘country’) and in fairness they are rather middle class customers. It can be worth fifty to a hundred quid a week at this time of year, cash, but it does take a lot of work. I have kept the same strain of Dutch rabbit for at least 30 years. They double up well as pets too, and they fetch a lot more! I shoot quite a few wildies too, when I have the time.

Damned good in a curry, though. :D
In three words I can sum up everything I have learned about life: It goes on.

Robert Frost.

Covid 19: After that level of weirdness ,any situation is certainly possible.

Me.
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Arwen Thebard
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Re: Rabbit

Post by Arwen Thebard »

Growing up it was certainly on our list, funny how things change and go out of fashion.

The BBC Good Food Guide has plenty of rabbit recipes, so it is still on the menu for many people.

https://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/collection/rabbit

Hmmm now wheres my big lamp?
Arwen The Bard

"What did you learn today?"
jansman
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Re: Rabbit

Post by jansman »

diamond lil wrote: Sat Dec 07, 2019 9:06 pm Up here people still eat a lot of it, but the wives will say "it's for the dog"... :mrgreen:
We get that statement at work with offal,its rather a posh area. :lol:
In three words I can sum up everything I have learned about life: It goes on.

Robert Frost.

Covid 19: After that level of weirdness ,any situation is certainly possible.

Me.
grenfell
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Joined: Thu Jul 04, 2013 7:55 pm

Re: Rabbit

Post by grenfell »

I've heard the same thing with regards to offal too. It's amazing ( to me at least) people's reactions when they will happily eat pork , bacon and ham but mention a trotter and you'd think you'd suggested poison. About the only offal i don't eat is tripe as i find it tasteless but worse than that is the texture.
There's a lot in the news recently about eating less red meat and specfically beef and in general i agree that consumption could drop but it just seems an uphill battle to change people when so many won't touch offal , trotters , tongue , brawn etc or rabbit . There seems to be less enthusiasm for game birds and fresh water fish too. Heaven knows how the idea of eating insects will ever catch on.
We're on the edges of a small town , semi rural if you like, rather than city dwellers yet i still see attitudes changing. By the way when we had rabbits we bred Californians as well as a smaller variety that i can't remember but looked a lot like wild ones. I cured the skins from some of the Californians and can remember at one time swapping them for trout caught by a friend of my father.
jansman
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Re: Rabbit

Post by jansman »

grenfell wrote: Sun Dec 08, 2019 9:13 am I've heard the same thing with regards to offal too. It's amazing ( to me at least) people's reactions when they will happily eat pork , bacon and ham but mention a trotter and you'd think you'd suggested poison. About the only offal i don't eat is tripe as i find it tasteless but worse than that is the texture.
There's a lot in the news recently about eating less red meat and specfically beef and in general i agree that consumption could drop but it just seems an uphill battle to change people when so many won't touch offal , trotters , tongue , brawn etc or rabbit . There seems to be less enthusiasm for game birds and fresh water fish too. Heaven knows how the idea of eating insects will ever catch on.
We're on the edges of a small town , semi rural if you like, rather than city dwellers yet i still see attitudes changing. By the way when we had rabbits we bred Californians as well as a smaller variety that i can't remember but looked a lot like wild ones. I cured the skins from some of the Californians and can remember at one time swapping them for trout caught by a friend of my father.
The whole offal,rabbit, and offcuts if you like is very much rooted in culture.Rabbits I can shift at work,to ( some) older folks,and a handful of local ' foodies'. The chef at our local gastropub uses them in Winter too.A lot of older people lived on them when there was little else,and so will not touch them anymore.Same with corned beef. We are richer than we were in the 60's and 70's.

When I worked at Leicester Market,we could shift trotters ,tripes,offal,chickens feet,gizzards in spadefuls.These items all went to Chinese,Indian,Bangladeshi and especially West Indian customers.They have a culture of eating what they can get,and making it tasty too.

I agree that we have to eat less industrially produced meat,but that is another topic.As a nation we need a massive culture shift towards more locally produced foods where it is possible.We eat too much.Grenfell is right about game and freshwater fish too.We eat a lot of game here ( got pheasant for dinner today), and I feel it is a very underutilised food source.There are acres of unused gardens,neglected fruit trees and bushes... but producing and procuring your own food is regarded as being what poor people do in our affluent culture.

Another cup of tea now and its rabbit cleaning time. :D
In three words I can sum up everything I have learned about life: It goes on.

Robert Frost.

Covid 19: After that level of weirdness ,any situation is certainly possible.

Me.
grenfell
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Joined: Thu Jul 04, 2013 7:55 pm

Re: Rabbit

Post by grenfell »

I should have added when i mentioned gamebirds that when we were discussing what to have i did mention pigeon . It's been a while since i've had that and while the reaction to rabbit wasn't exactly favourable the idea of pigeon was treated with even more disgust.
Arzosah
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Re: Rabbit

Post by Arzosah »

Wow ... so there are very few of us on here, from the sound of it, who grew up in cities, whose families had long lost touch with any kind of home grown resilience. Oops. In my 1st year at college, I stayed in a small college residence which was run by nuns, and one day they cooked rabbit for us. No one, and I mean, no one, ate it. Eighteen of us :oops:

If we were at subsistence, yep, I'd eat it (same to me as eating any meat, as I've been veggie for so long).
Appin
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Joined: Wed Jun 20, 2012 6:04 pm

Re: Rabbit

Post by Appin »

I can't understand the aversion.
My son went on scout camp and was introduced to rabbit and pigeon in a survival cooking event. Rated rabbit as boring but pigeon as delicious.

I like pigeon and still remember a very good resturant / hotel many years ago which did superb food offering a starter of " warm breast of pigeon in a wild musdroom sauce". Utterly delicious. Mushrooms form the local wood and pigeon well they politely warned us that they might have missed the odd peice of shot.

Go to the right trendy restaurant ( well may be not at the prices they charge) and you will find pigeon and rabbit on offer. Game in general is under rated but still there. Looking for venison for a casserole right now.

Now so queer as folk as they say.