Return of the rabbit?

Food in the raw doesn't scare me. I prefer meat on the bone to sanitised fillets. I don't keel over when eyeballed by a fish on my plate. Visual reminders that what I am eating was once part of a living creature don't bother me. Liver, trotters, thymus, bone marrow ... that's all fine by me, providing it tastes good. The 'yuck' reaction has passed me by, unless, that is, you count a visceral aversion to a Bernard Matthews turkey roll.

That said, I'm a townie, so Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall-style hunting / shooting / fishing skills are not exactly core competencies. Which makes me feel vulnerable. Just supposing that the environmentalist's nightmare scenario becomes a reality: we run out of oil, centralised food distribution grinds to a halt, and we are left fretting over what there will be for supper. How ruthless could I be? Would I find myself queueing up outside shops with bare shelves in the scramble for scare supplies, or would I embark on a crash course in self-reliance?

I know that I can grow leeks and identify chanterelles, but I'm painfully aware that when it comes to protein, I'm relying on other people to do my dirty work. Could I actually kill something because I wanted to eat it? As for all that gutting, skinning, plucking and butchering, would I bottle out of it like a wimp, or would I see it through, but then feel revolted at the prospect of eating it?

I had a very illuminating encounter with a dead rabbit recently up at Hairst, a sparky little harvest festival that's held annually in the pretty market town of Huntly, in rural Aberdeenshire. Steve Wright, a stalwart of the local Slow Food Convivium who runs a exceptional game business, was demonstrating how to skin a rabbit in the town's central square. Not so long ago this was looking like an archaic skill, but judging from the rapt attention of the assembled crowd - which included people who remembered when rabbit was a staple food alongside those for whom bunny is forever the subject of nursery friezes and bedtime books - a surprising number of us are now showing more than a passing interest.

There were comical walk-on turns for Steve's ferrets and his wiry terrier which scare the rabbits up from their subterranean burrows, but then we came to the pile of dead bunnies. Steve can skin and joint one in three minutes flat. We watched, transfixed, as he slipped the pale pink carcass out of its cosy skin. "Would anyone else like to try ?" he asked. I had to say yes. If you aren't prepared to face up to the way an animal is despatched and prepared for your plate, then you shouldn't expect to eat it.

My dead rabbit looked beautiful. One part of me just wanted to stroke its silky fur, give it a name, and tie a bow around its neck. The other was impatient to turn it into food. In essence, once the rabbit is paunched (its belly is cut open and the guts removed, a quick, straightforward operation best done in the field) you begin to pull away the furry skin at the belly cavity and make a small incision on the back. You then gradually pull up the flap of skin, easing it away from the carcass in two halves, freeing the muscle as you go, until you roll it down to the end of the legs where you simply cut off the skin, fur and foot with a heavy knife or kitchen scissors, along with the head and the tail. You can see it done here.

There are slightly different skinning techniques, but what bowled me over was just how easy it was - a bit like peeling off tight jeans - and how appetising the fresh, rosy meat looked and smelled. I found myself thinking of tarragon (the essential herb for Richard Corrigan's rabbit pie in his new cookbook The Clatter of Forks and Spoons, and mustard, for the classic French lapin à la moutarde. I could just see a pot of rabbit rillettes, enriched with goose, duck or pork fat.

Why do we tie ourselves in knots, chasing ethically-produced, free-range chicken at anything up to £15 a pop, yet ignore the free-range, wild-fed rabbits that this country has in abundance? Rabbit is an excellent, supremely healthy, naturally lean meat from an animal that has had a great life, and it only costs a couple of quid. For centuries British people relied on rabbit before it fell out of favour. Its very cheapness gave it negative connotations and our prejudice against it is now engrained. But as we start looking harder at our food bills a rabbit revival seems inevitable.

Last night, I braised £3 worth of wild rabbit with tomato, red peppers, smoked paprika and saffron. It fed four heartily and attracted compliments. Everyone mistook it for more flavoursome than usual chicken. I didn't skin this one, but - a curiously comforting thought - I now know that I could do if I had to.