The great object in cooking a hare is to keep it as moist as possible, and therefore the hare must not be put too close to the fire in the first stage of roasting. Prepare a stuffing of quarter of a pound of beef suet, chopped finely, two ounces of uncooked ham, a teaspoonful of chopped parsley, and two teaspoonfuls of dried mixed savoury herbs; add to this a quarter of the rind of a lemon, chopped very fine, a dust of cayenne pepper, salt, five ounces of breadcrumbs, and two whole eggs. Pound this in the mortar. The liver may be minced and pounded in with these ingredients if fresh. Place the stuffing in the hare, and place at a distance from the fire; have plenty of dripping melted in the dripping pan, and basting should go on and be continued from the very first. Then as the hare is getting on, baste with good milk, and then baste well with butter; put the hare near the fire so as to froth the butter, and at the same time dredge the hare with some flour, so as to get a good brown colour, and serve good rich gravy round it with half a glass of port wine in a tureen, and currant jelly should be handed with it.
Hare Cutlets à la Chef.
Take a freshly-killed hare, save the blood, paunch and skin it. Roast it, then cut off the fillets and cut them aslant and flatten them. Put the bones of the hare into a saucepan with two onions sliced, one good-sized carrot, a tiny piece of garlic, two cloves, and a bouquet garni, and one bayleaf. Moisten with a glass of white wine, and let all this steep and stew for an hour; then pass through a sieve, add a quarter of a boiled Spanish onion, and thicken with the blood of the hare. Make some hare stuffing, and moisten with some of the sauce, and make it into cutlets. To form cutlets similar to the fillet cutlets, place them in a frying-pan, and let them poach in water. Place the hare fillets and the stuffing cutlets in the pan and fry to a good colour in clarified butter. Put a small piece of the small bones of the hare in every cutlet and dish them in a crown. Fill the centre with a mixture of small onions, mushrooms, and small pieces of bacon, cut into dice which have been stewed in some of the sauce. Hand red currant jelly with this dish.
Hare en Daube.
French Recipe.
The hare must not be too high; cut it into pieces as for jugged hare. Rub into a stewpan a bit of bacon cut into squares; put the hare into it, together with thyme, bayleaf, spices, salt, pepper, and as much garlic as will go on the point of a knife. Add a little bacon rind blanched and cut into the shape of lozenges. When the whole has a uniform colour, moisten with a good glass of white wine, put on a close lid, and stew for four hours upon hot cinders. When ready to be served, pour away the lard, the spice, and the fat, and add a little essence of ham, and send to table hot.
Hare Derrynane Fashion.
Take three or four eggs, a pint of new milk, a couple of handfuls of flour, three yolks. Make them into a batter, and when the hare is roasting baste it well, repeating the operation till the batter thickens and forms a coating all over the hare. This should be allowed to brown but not to burn.
Filet de Lièvre à la Muette.
Cut a hare into fillets and stew them with a mince of chickens' livers, truffles, shalots in a rich brown gravy with a tumblerful of champagne in it.