Loin of rabbit, wild blackberry gel, mushrooms and cep sauce

The Recipes / Game

4 boned rabbit loins
Kidneys from the rabbit
Selection of mushrooms
8 small lettuce leaves

Blackberry gel
250ml blackberry purée
3g agar agar
1g xantham gum

Sauce
3tsp vegetable oil
A few chopped rabbit bones
50g each carrot, leek, onion & celery, chopped
20g dried ceps
50ml port
50ml madeira
1 chicken thigh, chopped 500ml chicken stock

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Serves 4

If you’re buying the rabbit saddles ready-prepared, be sure to ask the butcher for the bones for the sauce.

To prepare the gel, stir the agar agar and xantham gum into the blackberry purée in a pan, then bring to the boil. Leave to cool, and once set blend, adding a little salt and pepper, and pass through a sieve. Set aside.

Heat the oil for the sauce in a deep pan, add and brown the bones, then caramelise the vegetables. Add the dried ceps, port and madeira, then the chicken thigh and stock. Bring the pan to the boil, then simmer and skim for one hour. Pass through muslin into a clean pan and reduce to a sauce consistency over simmering heat: check the seasoning before serving.

Vacuum pack the rabbit loins with salt, pepper, and herb seasoning, then cook in a water bath at 56˚C for 40 minutes. Pan fry the kidneys till cooked pink. Finish the rabbit by removing from the vacuum pack and frying in a pan with a little hot butter. Season, then remove the loins from the pan and set aside to keep warm. Sauté the mushrooms in the same pan, adding the lettuce at the end to warm the leaves.

To serve place a good swirl of blackberry gel on clean hot plates, arrange the mushrooms and lettuce, slice and place the loins and kidneys with warm sauce drizzled around the edges.