Cannelloni with Rabbit, Plums and Turnip Greens

You don’t know whether to laugh or cry - apparently cookbooks are now following the trend of so-called cooking shows on TV. It no longer seems to be a question of content, but of the spectacle itself. Thus it happened to me now already for the repeated time that a high-quality put on cookbook badly fluffs with prescription data and preparation descriptions.

Mario Gamba stands out in particular here. His final editing seems to pay more attention to the admittedly chic photos than to the recipes. The already described nasty blooper in the basic dough should not have happened, and in the recipe recooked here the proportions are not right either. Gamba specifies 250 g dough, too much for a menu dish for 4 people. 150 g would have been enough. And the farce, which should be made here, is easily enough for 5-6 rabbit backs and correspondingly much pasta.

I made a virtue of necessity and made 24 ravioli and a good portion of tagliatelle from the leftovers.

The quantities given here are enough for a dish for two and 24 ravioli.

I purchased a whole rabbit at the market because it’s not much more expensive than two rabbit backs. After cutting it up, I freeze the legs and forelegs, and I need the rest for this recipe.

First I make the sauce. I cook

• about 1 l rabbit stock (from the bones of a rabbit, water, 1/4 liter white wine, bay leaf, pepper, 1 sprig of rosemary).

Then I roast

• 1 piece of celery, chopped 1 onion, chopped 2 tsp tomato paste

until everything has taken color. Then deglaze with 1/4 l port or sherry. Then add a ladle of rabbit stock and let it boil down. You don’t need much sauce for this dish and it gets more intense as you reduce it a lot. It didn’t need any salt in my case.

• 2 back fillets of rabbit

I fry them briefly, then cut them in half lengthwise and fry the cut edges briefly as well. This way I get 4 longish pieces for wrapping.

For the farce I need

• 160 g rabbit meat (original: turkey breast. For me, the remains of the taken apart whole rabbit just fit).
• 15 g liquid butter
• 80 g cream
• 1 egg
• salt
• pepper

First I cut the raw meat into small pieces. Then I put it in the freezer for a quarter of an hour, just like the cream. Then I chop the meat in a blitz chopper and gradually add the cream and then the rest. Don’t blend too long or the egg whites will curdle from the rubbing heat. The farce goes into a bowl, there I mix it with.

• 7 prunes, finely chopped
• 1 sprig of rosemary, finely chopped.

Now for the pasta:

• 300 g pasta dough (2 eggs to 200 g flour, 1 tbsp olive oil, salt).

I roll out on speed 7/9 and cut it into just square pieces. Now I can assemble the cannelloni. Farce on the dough, leaving a margin 2 cm free and not too thick! Put the rabbit meat on top and roll it up tightly. Then roll tightly in plastic wrap and then in aluminum foil. This way you get 4 silver cigar-like shapes. Put them in boiling water for 8 minutes.

Now quickly the vegetables, I have

• 500 g of stalk mush (enough this time!).

I just cut that into 2 centimeter long pieces and blanch the veggies for 2 minutes. Rinse well and squeeze. In the pot

• 50 ml cream
• 1 tablespoon coarse mustard
• good nutmeg

heat up and put the vegetables in it.

The re-unrolling is a bit fiddly, but it works before the noodle is cold. Now I can slice it diagonally, put it on the preheated plates and serve it with vegetables and sauce.

And during the week I make ravioli again, which I produce quickly after the meal and then freeze.

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