Stinking rabbit

[Flytrap]

My wife bought some rabbit meat from Tesco (chopped into cubes). We started to cook it up this lunch time and the smell was terrible!
I had to run to the bathroom, retching. Absolutle awful smell. We vacated the house and had a nice pub lunch instead, yum.
Came back and offered the rabbit meat to the cats, they both ran a mile.
Quickly put all the offending meat into the Bokashi bin. The house smells really bad now and I still feel sick.

Does rabbit meat always smell so bad or was it just off?

Flytrap

[vicky]

Rabbit seems to smell of hay or wet grass as it cooks (my family are anti it for this reason), but it shouldn't smell 'bad'.
If you think it's off keep the packaging and a SAMPLE of the meat!!! Recently I had a similar problem with their food and was told this was the correct procedure...and don't make a special trip to get it refunded as they won't reimburse you time or petrol to take it back...that sample should be nice when you return it next week!

[bobleponge]

In my experience rabbit shouldnt smell bad enough to make you retch. I would suggest it was probably off, although of course all of our noses are different. It does have its own smell, quite particular to rabbit, but certainly not as you have described.

[Flytrap]

The smell reminded me of the time I mistakely ordered Andouillette in Normandy. That's basically chitterlings or pigs colon and rectum. Yuk. A smell akin to rat pee and a very bad smelling public toilet. Excuse me while I go vomit again!

Flytrap

[petal]

Yes, we had rabbit stew recently and it does smell strong but I put it down to the fact we are all so used to bland meat perhaps its too unusually gamey for our modern tastes.

[Hilary B]

Rabbit meat in the supermarket is usually farmed, and the farming is often pretty intensive, comparable to battery chicken keeping. That could be why it tends to pong a bit. A lot of it is imported from China as well......
Wild rabbit is another matter entirely, definitely the 'gamey' flavour (and the smell while cooking) is not to everyone's taste, but it doesn't have that 'unhealthy' smell of the farmed stuff.

[Snadger]

The simple answer is if you've cooked rabbit before and this one smelled horribly different.......it was off!

[Flytrap]

Have never cooked it before. Have eaten it before in various forms in France and Greece. Was expecting a stronger smell than many other meats but I think there was something wrong with this one.
Maybe it would have tasted fine but wasn't going to risk it.
It's really put us off buying it again and to be honest I think it will be a long time before I order it again even pre cooked in a stew or anything.

Thanks for the replies.

Flytrap.

[Snadger]

Have never cooked it before. Have eaten it before in various forms in France and Greece. Was expecting a stronger smell than many other meats but I think there was something wrong with this one.
Maybe it would have tasted fine but wasn't going to risk it.
It's really put us off buying it again and to be honest I think it will be a long time before I order it again even pre cooked in a stew or anything.

Thanks for the replies.

Flytrap.

Get a gun or a lurcher.............you can be sure it's fresh then!

[di]

I can remember the 1st time I cooked it,I,d been given it all prepared by a friend,including the insides.Chucked it all in the pan & what a honk!!Was told later it was prob the offal!
I now just cook the "meat",& although it still has a far stronger smell than a lot of other meats....none so bad as that 1st time!Did your pack include offal?

[Flytrap]

Did your pack include offal?

No offal, just nice looking chunks of meat. Just smelled like offal. Maybe I was just over sensitive after my Andouillette experience as the smell was similar. But then my wife was almost as bad as me and wouldn't touch the stuff.
It's the smell I imagined when I saw a TV programme about a bloke on Exmoor (I think) who used to cook road kill. I think he was boiling up an old badger and his wife had to leave the house when he cooked it.

Flytrap.

[roitelet]

We eat a lot of Rabbit and it shouldn't smell. Take it back it was OFF

[Rodley]

[QUOTE=Flytrap;299747 A smell akin to rat pee and a very bad smelling public toilet.

Flytrap[/QUOTE]

As a microbiologist I would definitely say that the rabbit was off. The smell was probably ammonia or another protein breakdown product. Take it back and get recompense.

[jackie j]

Take it back not sure if they still do it but you might get double refund. Make a big fuss sometimes they give you a voucher to spend in store, also send an email to the company head office, they dont want you to complain to enviromental health.

[Nicos]

You can't be the only one who bought an off batch- someone's probably got some stored in their freezer
Take the packet back .
What a pity- hope it's not put you off from having more in the future.