Wild Rabbit Pie
by Veronica Taffs (Taffsy’s Mum)
Ingredients
2 rabbits (skinned, gutted, cleaned and jointed )
2 litres chicken stock
1 stick celery chopped
1 carrot diced
1 onion sliced Zest of ½ lemon Stalk of fresh parsley
2 bay leaves 1 tsp dried thyme
1 tsp black peppercorns
100g streaky bacon finely diced
200g button mushrooms sliced
100g flaked almonds toasted
1 cup fresh chopped parsley
1 420g can condensed mushroom soup
Shortcrust pastry*
* Rub 125g margarine or butter into 250g self-raising flour + pinch of salt and add water to mix and knead gently or use frozen store bought pastry.
Serves 4-6
Method
Pre-heat oven temperature to 200 degrees celcius.
1. Simmer rabbit in stock with celery, carrot, onion, lemon zest, herbs and peppercorns for 1 ¼ hours or till rabbit is cooked through and easily comes off bones.
2. Allow rabbit to cool in stock .
3. Gently fry bacon and mushrooms (add a knob of butter if insufficient fat comes out of bacon).
4. Mix bacon, mushrooms, cup of fresh parsley and flaked almonds in a large bowl.
5. Remove rabbit meat from the carcasses and cut up coarsely into chunks and add to bacon etc in bowl and mix and season with black pepper.
6. Heat up can of condensed soup and add about half a can of milk gradually to form a sauce consistency. Pour the mushroom “sauce” over the rabbit mix and stir well then spoon into pie dish.
7. Roll out pastry to cover pie and use a pie support in middle to let out steam or make a slit in the pastry. Brush with milk then place in centre of preheated oven at 200C and bake for about 20 minutes till pie crust browned and filling is piping hot.
Enjoy with mashed potatoes and green vegetables.
