Rabbit braised with red wine

My youngest brother is off to Marine recruit training down on Parris Island, SC, so I cooked him a little going-away dinner last weekend. On the menu -- rabbit. I decided on a braise, so looked up the basics for bunny braises on Epicurious. Pretty straightforward. The only trouble was that my bunny was whole, and I had no idea how to, uh, dismember him.

Lucky for me, some nice folks over at eGullet gave me some tips. I sectioned the back legs and forelegs off the body, then cut the body into three sections. Then I cut those in half. (Don't tell, but I threw out the belly flap -- later I learned this floppy piece of flesh makes great bacon.)

It was a quick braise -- about an hour. The only thing disappointing was when I looked under the lid and the sauce had turned into a muddy brown, rather than the reddish saucy hue I was looking for. So I squeeze a bit of tomato paste into the sauce for some color, and topped the whole dish with parsley for a bit of humor. (The bunnies around here mow my parsley to the ground.) Next to the rabbit is polenta with sage and romano cheese.

And for dessert we had creme brulee. The pitiful caramelization is due to the fact that my propane torch was running low on fuel.