Yes, cony: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/cony#English

See also the note at rabbit: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/rabbit#English apparently rabbits themselves are all French. "hare is indeed inherited from Proto-Germanic."

We did get poultry from French poulet

Chicken/poultry?

The introduction of rabbits to England post-dates the Norman conquest.

Rabbit is a pretty important part of traditional Maltese cuisine, rabbit stew is often considered a national dish, fried rabbit is also fairly common.

First time I heard of rabbit being considered to taste like chicken, they taste nothing alike.

Paella is commonly made with rabbit in Spain.

Lapin aux pruneaux is a wonderful dish. Serve with salad and mashed potato or french fries

https://bordeauxkitchen.com/rabbit-with-prunes-lapin-aux-pru...

You can coat the rabbit meat with Dijon mustard and cook it to make "Lapin à la moutarde" too!

It's not a knock-your-socks-off dish, I don't think the meat has enough qualities for such a dish (not enough of a distinct taste or texture or quantity), but it's always nice to have!

Brunswick stew is hearty[0], usually rabbit or squirrel traditionally, but these days with chicken. The Maltese variety as mentioned elsewhere is called Stuffat Tal Fenek as is very nice, having tried it in Malta.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brunswick_stew

My granny in Hungary always cooked it like your regular chicken soup (consomme) but of course replacing the chicken with rabbit

Like this https://streetkitchen.hu/receptek/nyulhusleves

It's quite common in Spain, in my family we eat that ~6 times a year. Honestly delicious, but I understand why people won't eat it.

Hare is pretty common game here in Finland and I think I must have eaten that fairly regularly when I was little but I have absolutely no recollection what it actually tasted like.

Only recipe I've seen was indeed a stew where the ingredients were almost "one rabbit, unholy amounts of garlic".

> is there any knock-your-socks-off dish

you need an example of what you consider such a dish.

Rabbits are pretty decent, as a kid we used to have quite a few of them at the village (along with all other kind of animals, incl. lambs, pigs, and goats). Either way it's rather easy to tell the meat apart and most meat(s) can be prepared to be delicious.

It used to be more common in the U.K. but it’s pretty rare now. Stews and braising were the traditional way to cook it as older ones are kind of tough.

Hmm. It's made me think about Lièvre à la Royale (Hare à la Royale), but of course Hares are not rabbits (they taste gamier).

The guys from Fallow made a video on YouTube about attempting to make a really good one.

Apparently Lapin à la Moutarde is the classic rabbit dish.

I like Sichuan's Zigong 冷吃兔 (cold-eaten rabbit)! Fried rabbit, dried chillies and numbing Sichuan pepper. Unforgettable.

In oven with potatoes!

Confit or cassoulet.

rabbit stew

We've raised meat rabbits for years, among other overstock.

Depending on where you live, a New Zealand/California mix is about as good as you can get for meat rabbits. They grow well and aren't overly delicate.

If you live somewhere with wild heat waves, just straight Californias, or some of the custom breeds from Texas A&M would be better to avoid heat deaths.

Also, you can just feed them grass in rabbit tractors, but they won't thrive like if they had access to a more varied diet. That's for all rabbits, not just meat rabbits

I have lived in many cities across different countries with dramatically varying economies, and the price of chicken has always been a good proxy for the cost of living. And maintains the same ratio to the price of a bus ticket (and similar things).

Does this phenomenon have a name?

In the rural UK area where I live farmers will often be happy to have you shoot them with an airgun, if you seek permission. Nice (if stewed) cheap meat.

Rabbit used to be the meat of the poor where I grew up. If you could not afford meat (beef/pork), you could always raise 5 to 10 rabbits in boxes in your garden and feed them with the grass from the road sides.

Price of chicken dropped steeply (and consumption exploded) in the second half of the 20th century after the introduction of broiler breeds and what’s essentially muscle tissue factories. Before that chicken was neither particularly cheap nor eaten that much.

Rabbit is comparatively cheap to produce, and available at low price wherever it is produced in larger quantities. Apparently no significant economies of scale where you live.

Also our most successful rugby league team’s name was given as a derogatory put down: “Rabbitoh”, which was seen as a poor sales person flogging rabbit meat for money

South Sydney being a poor area, yielded the South Sydney Rabbitohs

Rabbits were a depression-era food for Australians and was always considered a poor people's food. Being a pest does give make it popular either, much the same as carp is. Which is a shame, as both make great sources of cheap food.

Quite a contrast with the story

Since their introduction for a spot of recreational hunting, European rabbits have had a devastating effect on the ecology of Australia in general. Hence the Rabbit-Proof Fence, and its corresponding novel and film.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rabbits_in_Australia

I was surprised to learn that this has a name (or a few)

> Rabbit starvation (also called protein poisoning or mal de caribou)

The body can only digest so much protein and rabbits are so lean there is basically no fat to them outside their organs.

How is that an example of burying the lead? (I presume lede is the correct spelling, but burying lead for others to find in their drinking water amuses me.)

EDIT: saw the picture and yes. That certainly was catchy, but I the hn title is missing the subtitle: "until the black death made them commonplace".

*lede, since we are already in academic language-and-culture details territory.

https://www.merriam-webster.com/wordplay/bury-the-lede-versu...

Recently stumbled across this cooking video featuring chefs trying to recreate Michelin recipes. Lièvre à la Royale (Royal Hare).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TJtdtekV7xo

Let's just say it didn't make me want to try rabbit any time soon.

I have tried it in a French restaurant and it was delicious. Just don't think about how cute it would have been to cuddle instead. :-(

i have a very specific recipe passed down in my family, i boil in a mix of water and vinegar for about 20-25 minutes, before roasting it in the oven with potatoes and garlic. That way the specific taste and especially the smell is brought down, but it's otherwise very tasty.

This also works for goat or sheep meat.

You realise that rabbits were once so rare in Australia they had to be introduced to salve the British passion for killing small things?

The article claims:

  The European rabbit is a common sight in the British countryside today.
  Yet it was not always so. They are not native to the British Isles and are one of the most devastating invasive species.

From that time, until at most 1555 when:

  ... the Swiss naturalist Conrad Gesner could write that "there are few countries wherein coneys (rabbits) do not breed, but the most plenty of all is in England."