Rabbit legs, slowly stewed in sweet-and-sour Belgian kriek beer until the meat falls tenderly off the bone and the sauce has a deep, fruity pink glow. A classic Flemish stew that shows the typically Belgian use of fruit beer in cooking.
Rabbit in kriek beer
Region: Flanders
Rabbit in kriek beer
Region: Flanders
Method
01
Prepare the meat
Lightly dust the rabbit legs with flour, shaking off the excess. Season with pepper and salt.
02
Brown
Heat the butter in a casserole and brown the legs all over. Remove and set aside.
03
Sweat the onion and garlic
Sweat the onions in the same pan until translucent and lightly golden. Add the garlic and fry for 1 minute.
04
Deglaze
Deglaze with the kriek beer and scrape up the browned bits. Add the stock, redcurrant jelly, bay leaves and thyme.
05
Braise
Return the legs to the pan. Bring to the boil, cover and leave to braise gently over a low heat for 1¼ to 1½ hours until the meat is very tender.
06
Add the cherries
Add the sour cherries for the last 10 minutes and let them warm through gently.
07
Finish
Remove the bay leaves and thyme. Season with salt and pepper.
08
Serve
Finish with parsley and serve with stoemp or frites.
Tips & notes
Use real kriek beer (brewed with real cherries), not sweet cherry lemonade; the slight acidity of the beer is what keeps the sauce in balance. Rabbit dries out faster than beef, so keep the pan just below the boil rather than letting it boil hard. Keeps for 3–4 days in the fridge, and freezes very well (up to 3 months); the flavour often deepens further the next day.
Variations
- Replace the rabbit with chicken for a more accessible, quicker-cooking version.
- Add prunes instead of sour cherries for an autumnal variant.
Contains:
Gluten
Milk
Serve with
| Calories | 257 kcal |
|---|---|
| Protein | 12 g |
| Carbohydrates | 18 g |
| Fat | 14 g |
| Fibre | 1 g |
Estimated values, calculated from standard nutritional values per ingredient.
