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Why would a rabbit not be tender after 6 hours of slow cook ?


Salop Matt
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As above.

 

6 weeks ago I gave a chap a fresh shot bunny fully prepared ready to be cooked. He froze it for a couple of weeks and then defrosed it and next day cooked it for 6 hours in the slow cooker and found it to be tough.

 

He hasnt had rabbit before but his wife has and she`s never known one to be tough ! And from memory it wasnt a big old buck either . His wife has eaten rabbit befor ena never had a tough one either. And this chap can cook well and does most of the home cooking so cant see were it went wrong !

 

Ive never had this and cant think why it would be tough ! :unsure: :blink: :look: :hmm:

 

Anyone got any ideas ?

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I have never had a tough one either, funny thing is my Mum who is a very good cook managed to do the same thing

to a couple I gave her.

When she told me I was surprised as mine shot at the same time were great, mine had 2 hours in the oven, hers a bit longer but at a lower temp.

 

Neil.

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Very old :good:

 

A friend and I had a guinea fowl that may have been from 1-8 years old, we both reckon that they were 8 or older. I cooked mine like coq au vin, which works well with old cock pheasants, also had it happen with a roe neck cooked slow for over 3 hrs, tough as a whore`s heart.

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Rabbit is excellent meat but many are put off sometimes because of it being tough or strong tasting.

My wife is an excellent cook and this is our combined regime to get tender and bone free rabbit meat.

 

1) As soon as you have shot your rabbit, thumb it,which means running the thumb down the rabbits stomach while holding the front legs or head. This is to empty its bladder prior to gutting.

2) If you leave the rabbit half an hour or so before gutting allowing the body to cool a little it will make the whole procedure cleaner.

3) Once skinned wash the rabbit and leave to stand for a few hours in some salted water.

4) Drain and put into a saucepan of clean water and bring to the boil, once boiling turn down heat and simmer for 2/3hours or until it visibily starts to fall off the bone.

Turn off heat and let the pan cool with the rabbit,once cool you can pull the meat from the bones and use for tasty risoto's or pies. Leaving the rabbit to cool in the saucepan seems to be important. There are of course many ways to cook rabbit but this is a bomb proof way to provide cooked and tender meat for many recipes

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If the rabbit was scared when it died it may be almost impossible to cook until tender. Once the adrenalin goes around the system it makes meat tuff, we had this with a hoggit a couple of years ago when it was in the abbatoir the slaughterman failed to stun it properly so it was swinging around upside down aware of what was happening. I've never been so angry with a man in all my life, we took the carcass home anyway and i couldn't do a thing with it and I tried averything, I couldnt even get some of it through the mincer.

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  • 2 months later...

I here the sense in everything everyone is saying - old buck, adrenaline, freezer burn, but I've never experienced a tough rabbit once its been braised for a few hours.

To be fair, I don't think I've ever had a properly 'adrenalised' rabbit - headshot or nothing and if a second shots been required, it's happened in seconds. I have had the odd 'big old buck' and even had some freezer burnt meat. But still no tough meat.

 

Strange, and I hope it doesn't happen when I'm cooking for guests as that would tarnish my rep as a game cook ;)

 

Cheers

 

Duncan

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That might help; I tend to soak mine in a light salt water and white wine vinegar solution for an hour before rinsing and freezing. It makes the meat lose any interstitial fluid and enhances its sweetness while loosening up the dense muscle.

It takes out some of the gameiness too which some aren't so keen on.

 

Cheers

 

Duncan

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I find that all rabbit needs to be cooked with planty of oil or fat as it's such a lean meat. I recently coated srips of saddle in breadcrumbs and deep fried them which workd very well even with the large old bucks I had in the freezer (pain in the rear to skin so I thought a month in the freezer might help tenderise them).

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