Zsambék Rabbit and Apple Canapés
Two rabbit livers
Two rabbit hearts
Four rabbit kidneys
50 grams butter
nutmeg
black pepper
dash of bunny stock
dash of white wine (Légli 333)
salt to taste after frying
one dry, crisp apple
smooge of mustard
one boiled egg, separated and chopped
chopped parsley and lovage
leftover ciabatta
Cut leftover ciabatta very thin and toasted in the pan. Set aside.
In a small skillet, medium heat, melt 30-50 grams butter, add the hearts, wait a beat, then the kidneys, then the livers. You can dust them in flour if you’re worried you’ll burn them. Grind of black pepper, dash of rabbit stock from your jugged rabbit, reduce, dash of white wine, grind of nutmeg, reduce, sea salt to taste right before you take it off and set aside. For pinkish liver, five to seven minutes, since this is game.
Peel one dry crisp apple like Pink Lady or Topaz, cut in thin slices (2mm or so), sauté them in a very light amount butter in the same skillet for about a minute a side, then set aside.
Assemble the canapés on a nice but chipped one-of-a-kind plate from the toast, smooge of mustard (Dusseldorfer, sarf/hot), wheel of apple, thin slices of liver, grind of black pepper, finely chopped lovage and parsley over the plate, peel and separate the boiled egg, finely dicing yolk, then eggwhite, sprinkling over canapes for garnish.
The result is very aromatic and rich and went nicely on the transition from lager to Bikavér. I ate the hearts and the kidneys as I made the finishing touches.
Beef Tenderloin and Carmelized Sweet Onions with Walnuts and Dried Paprika Chili
This is for people who won’t eat rabbit, like teenagers or children who might feel a little threatened by the idea of eating bunnies. The tenderloin was marinated for five days, almost to the point of being high, along with the onions—you don’t have to go that far. I just couldn’t handle more meat at the time and then came the point to cook it. . I served this as an appetizer next to the rabbit liver canapés.
Half a small tenderloin, in thin slices
Five sweet medium onions, peeled and halved
One cup red wine
Six tablespoons soy sauce
One lime
Cracked black pepper
Two dried whole sweet paprika
Four garlic cloves
Handful of ruby-skinned walnuts
Slice the beef tenderloin thinly (half a centimeter or so), peel and halve the onions, place them in a glass bowl, add the red wine (Vida), soy sauce, lime juice, cracked black pepper, deseed and scissor in strips of the dry whole paprika, four garlic cloves, sliced in half, and a handful of walnuts. Marinate for at least half a day. Stir from time to time and add more soy sauce and red wine periodically if it turns into a longer process.
On a medium hot lightly oiled skillet, carmelize the whole onions, turning from time to time. If you modulate the heat well enough and give them a shake they should cook nicely. Then can be covered periodically too. The quality and flavor of the onion is important, as not every Grannie in the farmer’s market has good ones. Set aside when done, about 20 minutes. Wipe and reheat the skillet, reoil and saute the five-minute tenderloin slices/medallions at high heat, careful not to let them sweat but always fry. Adjust seasoning with soy sauce and ground black pepper. It might take a few rounds depending on the skillet. Set aside the tenderloins. Wipe clean again the skillet and fry up the drained remains of garlic, walnuts and paprika with a bit of marinade and splash of fresh wine and add to your now complete dish. The onions were outstandingly nice and juicy too.
Jugged Zsambék Rabbit
A brace of fresh young rabbits, just under three kilos dressed all together, with their offal. These are hard to find. Mine came from Hunyadi ter, prearranged and purchased from the fruitier from Zsambék, a Swabian town to the west of Budapest with a nice summer theater festival and plenty of stout fruit brandy. The rabbits were a lovely pink, clean, dry and had their offal.
Two sweet onions
Three bay leaves
Four cloves
Sprig of lovage
Liberal grind of black pepper
15 white pepper corns
Four small carrots
Four small parsley root
Half a celeriac
Two tablespoons sea salt
30 grams smoked bacon
Three knobs butter
Chickpea or regular flour
Half bottle red wind (Chateau Kajmád cuvee from Szekszard)
Water
In a substantial and good quality pot, sauté the rough chopped onions in butter on low to medium heat, along with the finely diced smoked bacon. Add bay leaves, cloves, grind of black pepper, white pepper corns. Meanwhile you have separated the rabbits’ fore and hind legs and quartered the saddles. I set aside and froze the four hind legs and two choice bits of saddle for a later meal. You will dust what remains in flour, seasoned with sea salt and grind of black pepper, adding more butter if needed beforehand to the onion, braising and sealing the rabbit saddles and fore legs for a few minutes a side and for a maximum of ten minutes. Meanwhile you clean and finely dice the carrot, parsley root and celeriac, a few garlic cloves, sage, few snipping of lovage.
Check to make sure nothing’s burning or singeing, add the vegetables, top up with red wine soon thereafter, top up again with red wine, fill to the surface level with water, and cover, simmering up to a boil and back to simmering over the next two hours, adding salt if needed.
I set this aside in the pantry for two days, knowing that this is the jugging part when the rabbit soaks up all the lovely red wine taste, then transferred to a cast iron casserole on the day I was scheduled to cook for dinner. That evening I baked it in a moderate oven for another 45 minutes, reducing the liquid. Reportedly, it was excellent and even a teenager ate some.
Puliszka (Hominy/Polenta)
3-4 cups boiling water
1 ½ cups stone ground corn meal
sea salt to taste
50 grams smoked bacon
1 ½ cups cooking oil
sheep’s curd (optional)
chanterelles (optional)
This dish goes by many names: hominy grits in the United States, polenta in Italy, mamaliga in Romania, and it’s cousin in Ghana, kenkey.
In a heavy cast iron pot with a short handled wooden spoon, the flame on medium, add the corn meal, then quickly add the preboiled water, adding in portions, stirring out the lumps, to a fairly wet consistency, turn up the flame and keep stirring regularly, basically until it has reduced and the spoon more or less stands up in the hominy. That's the trick and means its done. Set aside.
In a thick heavy skillet on medium high heat, fry up the finely diced bacon until crisp, top up the pan with a liberal amount of oil and add the hominy porridge. Fry well, adding more oil as needed, cutting slices and turning as needed, until it’s golden crisp on the outside. It takes about a quarter hour. You can also add wild mushrooms like chanterelles or some wickedly salty and sour Transylvanian sheep’s curd.
Hot Spring Onion Salad with Roasted Nuts and Balsamic
Eight bunches spring onions (about six to a bunch), cleaned, washed, and topped midway
Two handfuls hazelnuts
One handful walnuts
One handful ruby-skinned walnuts
Sprig of fresh lovage
Small bunch of parsley
Small bunch of fresh dill
Three tablespoons balsamic vinegar
Four tablespoons olive oil
Teaspoon salt
Dash of medium sherry
In a medium wok, sauté the clean, dry whole onions on high heat with a splash of cooking oil about four to six minutes. Dash of medium sherry to deglaze. They should be still a bit crunchy. Wipe the wok and roast two handfuls of whole hazelnuts, adding two handfuls of walnuts about five minutes later as the hazelnuts need a head start. I really like the ruby-skinned ones I sometimes find in the market. Shake and roast as necessary on low to medium heat the next ten minutes. Set aside and cool. Rub off some of the skins if you can. Then chop very roughly with the knife. Scissor in the lovage, parsley, and dill into your onions. Add the nuts. Shake in some sea salt, add the olive oil and balsamic vinegar, and bingo.
Spring Iceberg Lettuce Salad
Three small heads of fresh iceberg lettuce, cleaned, washed and torn
Pinch of brown sugar
Three pinches of salt
Two tablespoons red wine vinegar (homemade)
Two tablespoons olive oil
Splash of fresh squeezed lemon juice
Comment: The canapés were superb, the tenderloin tangy, soft and good, the rabbit was falling off the bone, really sweet and delicious, great juice, the iceberg lettuce a great cooler but almost superfluous in light of the discovery of the hot spring onion roasted nut salad.
Served six for dinner and takes a few days to prepare for full flavor effect.
Served with Thummerer Egri Bikavér 2006.
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