We have a few homemade rabbit sausage recipes here on the site, and we’re working to bring you even more.
No library of sausage recipes would be complete without some of the best basics, of course, and one of those has to be Hot Italian Sausage.
(If you’re not a hot spice eater, even though this recipe is not too spicy, you might like this homemade Sweet Italian Rabbit Recipe instead.)
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Rabbit is the Perfect Lean Sausage Meat!
If you haven’t made or tasted rabbit sausage (of any kind), you’re in for a real treat!
Rabbit meat is mild and blends exceedingly well with all sorts of spices and in all sorts of combinations. Of all the ground meats I’ve cooked with or made sausage with, the rabbit has to be one of my favorites – if not flat-out the absolute best!
Rabbit meat becomes one with the spice and flavor for a full-flavor experience, whether used as ground or mixed to make homemade sausage.
The best part? It’s lean and healthy, too! The leanest meat you could grow and eat!
But let’s get on to the recipe – if you’re here, there’s a good chance I don’t have to tell you how well rabbit meat works as a sausage!
Homemade Hot Italian Rabbit Sausage Recipe
Makes 10 pounds of rabbit sausage.
Ingredients
You will need:
- 9 pounds of Rabbit Meat Trim
- 1 pound of *Pork Fat (optional – see notes below)
- 2 tablespoons Salt
- 1 tablespoon Black Pepper
- 1 ½ tablespoons Fennel
- ¼ cup dried Parsley
- 6 cloves Fresh Garlic (or 2 tablespoons dried)
- ½ teaspoon Caraway seed
- 3 tablespoons Paprika
- 1 tablespoon Crushed Red Pepper**
- 1 cup ice water
**If you like your sausage even spicier, increase the red pepper by one teaspoon and add two more teaspoons of paprika. Or use one tablespoon of red pepper, but use ground instead of crushed.
Instructions:
- De-bone your rabbit into trim. Pieces can be large and long as long as they can fit through the neck of your grinder.
- Make sure the carcass is cold when you are trimming it out.
- It’s important to work with cold meat all the way through the sausage-making process! Not only is this food safe, but it makes your life worlds easier. Warm meat is too soft for easy trimming and far too soft and sticky to grind. It just won’t move through your equipment.
- At each stage of the process, put waiting trimmed meat back in the refrigerator or even the freezer to keep everything cold and workable.
- Grind the fat and trimmed rabbit meat through a coarse plate.
- Mix all of the herbs and spices together in a small bowl.
- Sprinkle the spices evenly over the ground meat.
- Pour the cold water over the meat and spices.
- Mix to combine. Continue to mix until the spices are evenly distributed.
- Return the ground, spiced meat to the fridge or freezer until it is cold throughout. (To speed this up, you can put it in the freezer for an hour or two, but if you’re refrigerating the mixture overnight to complete it the next day, don’t freeze the meat, just leave it overnight in the refrigerator).
- When the meat and spice mixture is cold all the way through, grind it a second time, this time using a medium plate (for a smaller crumble, use a fine plate).
- If you will be using the sausage as loose sausage, ground, or forming it into patties, you can stop here. (Ground is great in many dishes, and patties are excellent in the summer on the grill!)
- If you want to make sausage links, you will need to stuff the sausage mixture into casings. Before you attempt to stuff the casings, make sure you cool the meat out again!
For tips and instructions on how to stuff rabbit sausage into links, read here: How to Make Rabbit Sausage Links (How to Stuff Sausage Casings)
For more tips on grinding rabbit meat, read How to Grind Rabbit Meat + Tips for Boning and Grinding
*Pork fat optional – instructions for adjustment
Fat is only added to this rabbit sausage as a binder and a moistener, since rabbit does not naturally have a lot of fat in it.
You can leave the pork fat out, though your sausages may be firmer and drier. (I do not find this to be a real negative and I like the clean flavor of rabbit sausage without the stronger pork flavor; I frequently leave the pork fat out and we all like – love! -- it just fine.)
If you prefer to make an all-rabbit sausage, which makes sense, you can leave out the pork fat. However, you do want to increase the amount of rabbit meat to make an equivalent measure of meat.
So, for each batch, use 10 pounds of rabbit meat if you’re not mixing in pork fat.
You could substitute another type of fat, too.
For example, if you have cultural or dietary restrictions that prevent you from eating pork, you might choose a different type of fat. Chicken fat would be a good, mild fat substitute (though you may have difficulty obtaining it in large enough quantities).
Whatever you use, do not cut out the little fat that the rabbit meat does have – always include that as part of your rabbit meat measure. It’s never enough to throw off your measurements.
Ways to Use Hot Italian Rabbit Sausage
This Hot Italian Rabbit Sausage is very versatile. Use it in any dish where you would use chicken sausage or pork Italian sausage.
This list is certainly not exhaustive, but here are some suggestions:
- Grill patties for a great alternative to summer burgers
- Use in biscuits and gravy
- In lasagna and pasta dishes
- In soups
- Pan fry or grill links for sausage grinders – add sauteed, grilled, or roasted onions and peppers!
Enjoy!!
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