Hugh's Rabbit and Partridge Stew

By Helen

Main Ingredients:

• One rabbit (skinned)
• Two partridges (plucked)
• Tinned tomatoes
• Onions and carrots
• Thyme and bay

A trip to Borough Market on a December morning - especially without breakfast inside you - is always going to end in a shopping spree. 

But what to choose? Squid? Drunk cheese? Still-twitching lobster? In the end I decided on rabbit and, for any sentimental dinner guests, partridge. I didn't think I'd eaten, never mind cooked either of these before until my mum sheepishly admitted: 'We fed you rabbit. We just didn't tell you what it was.'

The first job was jointing the rabbit - removing the last few organs and chopping into manageable pieces, which wasn't too bad - thankfully the head had already been taken care of and I had some step by step instructions. I browned the pieces (as well as the halved partridges) and added to a casserole dish with stock, wine, peppercorns, garlic, tomatoes, thyme, bacon and bay leaves, then chucked in the oven for 90 minutes.

The smell was immediately distinctive - definitely not chicken! The final product divided opinion - I preferred the larger, milder chunks of rabbit but others preferred the gamier partridge. Having picked at the bird carcasses I'm not convinced it was the best use of them. Neither was especially tender and might have benefitted from longer cooking. But in terms of trying something new, a success on several fronts, and not as expensive as I'd thought at around £3.30 a head.

Best for... Facing up to where your dinner comes from
Taken from... Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall - River Cottage Every Day
Chris says... The partridge was my favourite; very rich meat, but quite fiddly to get off the bones.