Selecting and preparing a rabbit carcass before baking
When choosing a rabbit carcass, you must consider the following recommendations:
- The meat of a young animal is the most delicious. It is necessary to take the carcass of an animal whose age is no more than 6 months. The weight of the product is about 1 kg.
- If the meat is dark in color, it is tough and not very tasty. A high-quality carcass should have a pinkish color with light veins.
- The fresh product does not have a specific smell. However, if there is a rotten, rotten or bitter smell, then the meat is spoiled.
- To accurately identify meat, the carcass must have a tail, a paw with hair or claws, or an ear.
- When purchasing a product in a store, the meat must have a quality mark on it.
- If the carcass is kept in a vacuum container, the meat must be dry and the container clean, without traces of ice or blood.
- You can determine whether the meat has been re-frozen or not by the condition of the label. If the product has been handled in this way several times, it will be dirty and look like wet paper.
Before baking, the rabbit carcass is prepared. To do this, it is pre-soaked in a marinade so that the meat is soft and juicy. Moreover, this procedure allows you to eliminate the specific smell that is characteristic of rabbit meat. It is immersed for 2 hours in a cool liquid into which 15 ml of vinegar is poured.
To eliminate hardness and muffle the specific odor, you can place the product in whey for approximately 2 hours.
To ensure that the product becomes tender and soft after baking, the meat is marinated in white wine. It is not recommended to use a red drink, as it will change the color of the carcass.
Classic recipe for baked whole rabbit
A whole rabbit carcass can be baked in the oven, after rubbing the meat with aromatic dried spices.
The product harmonizes well with basil and ground pepper.
What ingredients will you need?
If olive oil is not available, you can use a regular refined product.
The products required for making your own rabbit in the oven are shown in the following list:
- basil - to your taste;
- rabbit – 1.5 kg;
- olive oil - at your discretion;
- salt, pepper - as needed;
- vinegar - to taste.
Step-by-step cooking process
The process of creating rabbit meat in the oven is based on the following points:
- The carcass should be washed and then immersed in a cool liquid diluted with vinegar for approximately 60 minutes.
- Then the product must be removed and dried with a paper towel. Then you need to apply a mixture of salt, pepper, basil and olive oil to the surface in an even layer.
- Afterwards, the rabbit should be placed in the refrigerator for approximately 12 hours.
- After the time has passed, you will need to coat the baking sheet with vegetable oil, placing the rabbit carcass on its surface with its back down, stretching its limbs as much as possible.
- By placing the rabbit in the oven, heated to 200 °C, it will take about 1 hour to prepare the treat.
Serving rules, decoration
Before serving, the baked rabbit is decorated with fresh parsley leaves. You can place fresh chopped vegetables around the meat. Potatoes or rice porridge are suitable as a side dish.
Baked rabbit with honey and bacon
Incredible recipe! We really liked it.
