Breaking down a whole rabbit for the first time can seem intimidating—don’t fret! It is very simple. The rabbit can be served with whatever you like, but for this recipe I have included a delicious and herb-forward pasta salad with summer vegetables. The dish is light, lean, and really tasty!
You can use whatever herbs and vegetables you like to make the pasta salad. Regular cous cous would work great here, if you prefer that instead of the larger, Maravilla pasta used in this recipe.
Red Wine Slow-Braised Rabbit with Summer Vegetable Pasta Salad
Breaking down a whole rabbit for the first time can seem intimidating—don’t fret! It is very simple. The rabbit can be served with whatever you like, but for this recipe I have included a delicious and herb-forward pasta salad with summer vegetables. The dish is light, lean, and really tasty!You can use whatever herbs and vegetables you like to make the pasta salad. Regular cous cous would work great here, if you prefer that instead of the larger, Maravilla pasta used in this recipe.
Ingredients
For the Braised Rabbit:
- 1 whole rabbit, organs removed, cut into sections
- 1 Tbsp Kosher salt
- 2 Tbsp vegetable oil
- 4 Tbsp salted butter
- 2 onions, large dice
- 2 carrots, peeled & roughly chopped
- 1 celery stalk, large
- 3 cloves garlic, diced
- 1 cup red wine
- 4 cups cold water
- 3 bay leaves
- 2 cups fortified chicken stock
- 3 tsp Kosher salt
For the Pasta Salad:
- 1 cup dried Maravilla pasta, or whatever pasta you like
- 2 cups fortified chicken stock
- 1 ripe tomato, small dice
- 2 tsp Kosher salt
- ¼ red bell pepper, small dice
- ¼ yellow bell pepper, small dice
- Zest of ½ lime
- Juice of 1 lime
- ¼ red onion, small dice
- 2 cloves garlic, minced
- 3 Tbsp fresh cilantro, finely minced
- 2 Tbsp fresh basil leaves (about 8 leaves), finely sliced
- 2 Tbsp fresh mint leaves (about 8 leaves), finely sliced
- 2 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil, as garnish
Instructions
For the Braised Rabbit:
- Use some Kosher salt to lightly salt the rabbit sections on all sides.
- In a large saute pan, add the vegetable oil to the pan, and increase the heat to high, and wait until the oil is nearly smoking.
- While the oil is heating up, quickly pat the rabbit sections dry using some paper towels.
- Add the rabbit sections to the hot oil, and brown the rabbit sections on all sides.
- When the rabbit pieces are browned, remove them from the pan.
- Deglaze the pan with a few tablespoons of red wine, and transfer the deglazing liquid to your rabbit braising pot.
- Add your prepared vegetables from earlier to the rabbit braising pot, along with the remaining red wine, the water, bay leaves, and chicken stock.
- Add the salted butter to the braising liquid.
- *Because the rabbit meat is so lean, adding some extra fat to the braising liquid helps to add some richness to the final braised rabbit product.
- Bring the mixture to a simmer, and reduce the heat to the lowest setting.
- *You want the braising liquid to barely show any movement at this stage.
- Season your braising liquid with some additional Kosher salt, to taste.
- Cook the rabbit sections at a sub-simmering level for about 2-2.5 hours, or until the rabbit sections are fully cooked and the meat is nearly falling off the bones.
For the Pasta Salad:
- Bring your 2 cups of chicken stock to a boil in a medium-sized pot, and combine with 1 cup of dried Maravilla pasta.
- Cook your pasta according to package instructions, or until the pasta is completely tender and soft.
- Drain the pasta from the liquid, and set aside.
- Place the cooked and drained pasta in a medium-sized mixing bowl.
- Incorporate the remaining pasta salad ingredients including the herbs and vegetables into the cooked pasta mixture.
- Drizzle the pasta salad with a bit more olive oil, and get ready to plate up.
- Serve plates with the summer vegetable and herb pasta salad, topped with a section of the red wine braised rabbit that you cooked earlier.
Notes
Maravilla pasta is almost like a large-sized cous cous product. In Spain, they don’t use Maravilla pasta for making a pasta salad type dish like this—it would be traditionally used in soups…but this made a lot of sense to me, and tasted really wonderful.