Take care to collect all the blood when emptying the hare; break the bones of the legs, that they may be easily trussed; clear the legs and the fillets of all tendons, and lard them. Chop up the liver, the lungs, the heart, and four fowls’ livers, together with five oz. of fat bacon.
Add to this mincemeat five oz. of soaked and pressed bread-crumbs, the blood, two oz. of chopped onion, cooked in butter and cold; a pinch of chopped parsley, a piece of crushed garlic the size of a pea, and three oz. of raw truffle parings. Mix the whole up well; fill the hare with this stuffing; sew up the skin of the belly; truss the animal, and braise it in white wine for about two and one-half hours, basting it often the while. Glaze at the last moment. Serve the hare on a long dish.
Add two-thirds pint of half-glaze game sauce to the braising-liquor; reduce; clear of grease; strain, and add three oz. of chopped truffles to this sauce.
Pour a little sauce over the dish on which the hare has been set, and serve what remains of the sauce separately.
[1812—RÂBLE DE LIÈVRE]
The French term “râble” means the whole of the back of the hare, from the root of the neck to the tail, with the ribs cut very short.
Often, however, that piece which corresponds with the saddle in butchers’ meat alone is taken, i.e., the piece reaching from the croup to the floating ribs. Whatever be the particular cut, the piece should be well cleared of all tendons, and finely larded before being set to [marinade]; and this last operation may even be dispensed with when the “[râble]” is derived from a young hare.
Marinading would only become necessary if the piece had to be kept some considerable time.
[1813—RÂBLE DE LIÈVRE A L’ALLEMANDE]
Set the [râble] well dried on the vegetables of the [marinade], which should be laid on the bottom of a long, narrow dish. When it is nearly cooked, remove the vegetables, pour one-quarter pint of cream into the dish, and complete the cooking of the [râble], basting it the while with that cream.