At dusk and dawn our garden has an invasion of fluffy tailed friends. These seemingly cute critters are ravaging my garden and whilst I’ve worked hard to put up mini fences to protect the trees, flower beds, potager and fruit bushes things are still getting out of hand. These hungry bunnies are now scoffing my daffodils and tulips. Drastic action is necessary especially as we are entering the breeding season and we can expect numbers to multiply even more. There is no doubt we are offering gourmet options for the rabbits but it was time for us to enjoy a new culinary adventure.
I admit when that the dirty deed is a little beyond me although I’ve watched enough River Cottage programmes to know how wild rabbit is caught. Our lovely neighbour Ross played the hunter and one evening tapped the window of my office and held up our prize.  I gave him the thumbs up and returned promptly to my coaching call which he’d interrupted. Although he’d been popping down every night with his armoury it was still a surprise to finally have a wild rabbit sitting in my refrigerator.
There is always something humbling to see animal/bird carcass before it comes food. It’s a true reminder that this was a living and breathing being and I truly hope that it was treated well and had a cared for life. In the case of this rabbit I’ve no doubt it’s been feasting on plenty of lush grass and the occassional ornamental tree. Nevertheless I was pretty keen to turn this into something that looked less like the real thing and something ready for the pot.
With our trusty Meat book we set on our culinary adventure to make wild rabbit stew. In truth is was pretty much the same as making any type of meat stew.
I was pretty excited nevertheless to see how our first adventures into wild food would turn out.
As we tucked into our aromatic stew that tasted good our excitement soon turned to disappointment. Despite a long slow cook the rabbit turned out to be less than tender and to be honest not nice to eat. Luckily the vegetables and gravy were delicious. I reckon our neighbour managed to hunt this rabbit because it was old and slow and ever so tough!
I’m not daunted though and will try again with another wild rabbit if we get the chance. I’ve never seen rabbits in the shops here in New Zealand although a quick internet search shows there are rabbit farms so I obviously am not looking hard enough. You’d think with two hounds bred for hunting we might have a regular supply of rabbit for our table. After many unsuccessful attempts at chasing rabbits Fortnum and Mason have concluded that it’s just not worth wasting energy and will sit and watch them rather than run after them. They do love to follow their scent long after they’ve disappeared into the bush. Although this culinary adventure wasn’t a total success I’m sure that there will be many more to come that will delight.
One of the books I did manage to read at 35,000 feet was Doing Without Delia where the author Michael Booth undertook a course at the Cordon Bleu School and then went onto work in a Michelin Star Restaurant. Whilst the book gives an interesting insight into the world of the Cordon Bleu School and indeed the life of a professional chef it wasn’t a brilliant book – a little disjointed and it lacked energy. It did however give me plenty of food for thought (pardon the pun!) about what it takes to be a great cook.
Whilst I’ve obsessed about following recipes the one thing that did resonate with me about this book is Booth’s proposition that you should learn to cook without a recipe. Learn enough about cooking that you can create your own from ingredients. As I become more and more focused on food production from our own backyard I’m thinking there is maybe a new project for me to focus on in the future to finally learn how to cook properly – without a recipe book. Maybe if the Cordon Bleu School ever manages to reach us in Wellington this might open up a new culinary adventure for me. Not quite the kiwi Julia Child but you never know!