Recipes

The lepre al civet

July 5, 2011
Hare in civet

Ingredients

  • one just hunted hare hung up for eight days in the refrigerator
  • hare’s blood
  • 1,5 liters Dolcetto vintage wine
  • one carrot
  • half onion
  • one bay-leaf
  • ten split peppercorns
  • five cloves
  • a piece of cinnamon
  • one stalk of celery
  • one garlic clove
  • 50 gr bacon fat
  • 50 gr butter
  • salt
  • 1/4 liter broth
  • half glass of Marsala

What to prepare

  • a big knife
  • a sifter
  • a carving fork
  • a salad bowl
  • a copper casserole

Procedure

Chop the hare in pieces, making sure that once it has been skinned you collect its blood that will later be used to marinate it, a day or two before cooking it, completely covered with Dolcetto wine.

Then add to the wine the following: a carrot, half onion, a bay leaf, pepper, cloves and cinnamon, a stalk of celery and a garlic clove. Finally comes cooking time, take the hare out of the wine and add all the flavors, in a copper saucepan with 50 grams of chopped bacon fat and 50 grams of butter.

Add salt and brown well on a high flame, then skim the fat and add some broth. Half way through the cooking add the wine used to marinate the hare and end cooking very slow.

Ten minutes before serving it, sift the sauce with all the vegetables’ pieces and together with the hare’s liver, put it all back in the saucepan with the hare and add half glass of Marsala.

Before you marinate it, we suggest you rinse the hare with wine, never with water.

Photo Credit: Charles Haynes