Bienvenue Chez N&G! Au menu de ce soir, nous avons Coq au Vin.

Nous sommes tres hueruex que vous êtes ici!

When I started out to write this blog, one of my goals was to teach myself some of the classics, so it’s about time I got to that. A few weeks ago G and I had a couple we adore, but don’t get to see often enough, over for dinner. They are also a couple of foodies with refined tastes, so I thought it was the perfect chance to try a dish I’d been meaning to attempt for a very long time – Coq au Vin.

I took this particular recipe from a completely delightful cookbook I picked up at the LA Times Festival of Books at UCLA, called Bistro: Swinging French Jazz, Favorite Parisian Bistro Recipes,. It’s from a series called Shannon O’Connor's Menus and Music. Each book centers on a theme and comes with a CD of music that pairs with the theme. Thus, while I was cooked away in the kitchen I got into the spirit of the dish with sounds of Edith Piaf and the like. All of the recipes are taken from various famed French bistros. To further help put you in the proper mood, a history of each location is included in the book, along with descriptions of the neighborhoods they inhabit. Should all of this so inspire you that you can’t help but jet off to Paris, the book includes the addresses and nearest metro station to each bistro to help you track down the original dishes. The recipe for Coq au Vin hails from Chez Allard in the Latin Quarter of Paris, and I was very excited to try it, especially because trying this recipe meant I’d get to flambé!

Here is their recipe:

One 5-pound chicken, cut into pieces
Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
2 tablespoons rendered chicken fat, or 1 tablespoon butter, or 1 tablespoon olive oil
(We didn’t have chicken fat, but we did have extra pork fat. G saves extra bits he shaves off of meats whenever he cooks and stores them in the freezer. I used a little of that and a little butter.)
7 ounces bacon, cut crosswise into ¼ inch pieces (mmmmm . . . bacon)
3 onions, chopped
3 garlic cloves, crushed
1 pound mushrooms, quartered
(In addition to regular button mushrooms, we happened to have a bag of dried chanterelles. G reconstituted some for me and we added those for extra depth of flavor.)
1 tablespoon tomato paste
1 cup (8 oz) Cognac or brandy (I used Cognac)
8 cups dry red wine, such as Burgundy, Pinot Noir, or Zinfandel
Bouquet garni: 1 parsley sprig, 1 thyme sprig, and one bay leaf tied in a cheesecloth square
2 tablespoons butter at room temperature
3 tablespoons flour

Generously sprinkle the chicken pieces with salt and pepper. In a large sauté pan or skillet over medium heat, melt the chicken fat, or melt the butter with the olive oil, and brown the chicken pieces, in batches if necessary, well all over, 12 to 16 minutes. Transfer the chicken to a large heavy casserole with a lid or a Dutch oven.

In the same sauté pan or skillet, fry the bacon over medium heat until the fat is rendered and the bacon is golden brown, about 5 minutes.

Sprinkle the bacon pieces over the chicken. Sauté the onions and garlic in the bacon fat for 5 minutes, or until golden. Using a slotted spoon, transfer the onion mixture to the chicken to the chicken. Add mushrooms to the same pan, season with salt, and sauté for 5 minutes, or until the mushroom liquid evaporates.

Using a slotted spoon, transfer the mushrooms to plate and set aside. Stir in the tomato paste and Cognac or brandy into the pan with the chicken, heat, and carefully ignite with a long-handled match. When the flame subsides, pour in the red wine. Add the bouquet garni and salt and pepper to taste. Cover and cook over low heat for 45 minutes, or until chicken is tender when pierced with a fork. Using a slotted spoon, transfer the chicken to a large plate; cover with aluminum foil to keep warm.

Bring the sauce to a boil over high heat and cook to reduce by half. In a small bowl, mash the butter with the flour to make a paste and whisk into the sauce until smooth and thickened. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Add the chicken and the mushrooms and simmer for 5 minutes to heat through. Serve now, or cover and refrigerate for 1 to 2 days. Reheat covered, in a low oven.

Makes 6 servings

Two comments off the bat:

1. I have this cooking experience to thank for a newfound appreciation for Cognac.

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2. Give yourself time for this one. It’s meant to be slow cooking. Traditionally, this dish was prepared with an old rooster, or coq. The long, slow cooking in wine was meant to break down and tenderize the tough old bird. The book suggests that it can be prepared a day or two in advance. I’d say it definitely should be if at all possible. It really will taste a lot better, coq or no coq. Our friends Danielle and Jason came to dinner on Wednesday. I started after work on Monday night and I benefited from the extra time in many ways.

I’ll admit this recipe has a lot of steps. It could be easy to get overwhelmed, but just take it one step at a time and it’s really not so difficult. However, that initial step of browning all of that chicken will take you a while. There is no “if necessary” as they say in first paragraph. It will be necessary. I have the biggest cast iron skillet imaginable. Seriously, it’s huge. We don’t bother moving it because it’s just that heavy – it just lives on our stovetop. It looks like it would make a good weapon, but swing that thing around is more likely to take you down before you ever have a chance to get close to any aggressor. Anyhow, the point is that even using a really large skillet, it took me a few batches. I kind of underestimated how long that would take, but you don’t want to overcrowd the pan because then the chicken won’t brown as well, so it’s better to take your time.

From there it’s pretty easy going for a while – just sautéing vegetables and layering them onto the chicken.

Once the veg is all cooked and the mushrooms are set aside, it’s time for the fun. Pour on the Cognac and then . . . Fire! I didn’t have a long match, but my stove lighter wand worked beautifully.

Be careful of course, stand back, wave the flame over the alcohol soaked chicken and it will catch pretty quickly. Then just enjoy your own private fire show. Pyros that we are, G and I watched transfixed for quite a while. Fun!

When the fire died down, we added the wine and spices. I didn’t have cheesecloth for the bouquet garni, so I did a quick search online and found that a coffee filter is a good substitute. I put the herbs in that, tied it with cooking string, and put it in the pot with the chicken and wine to simmer for a while.

It was now near midnight, and as is seemed like a logical stopping point, I put the lid on it and stuck it in the fridge to continue on tomorrow. I tasted it before putting it away and the sauce had a beautiful flavor. However, it seemed like there was less sauce in there than I would have expected, as it was not completely covering the chicken. Oh well, off to bed.

The next morning I realized that apparently I can’t read. I went back to look at the recipe with thoughts of moving to the next step. What caught my eye was the wine quantity. “8 cups dry red wine.” I had read 8 oz. I had added one cup from the bottle of Zinfandel I’d purchased, and well, the rest of that bottle was long gone. Oops.

I was going out with some friends that night, but I managed to make to sneak in a trip to TJ’s to purchase a couple more bottles of the same zin I had been using – I was trying to maintain consistency. When I got home late that night, I realized that not only could I not read, I didn’t know how to do basic math either. I poured in all of the wine I purchased, counting out each cup, and realized that I was still short a bottle. Luckily, we had more wine lying around, just not of the same kind. Oh, well. So much for consistency. *sigh*

All the wine goes into the pot. Wow. 8 cups is actually a lot of wine. It’s like 3 ½ bottles. I added the remaining ingredients and once again let it simmer for a little bit. But when I went to taste the sauce this time, it tasted completely off. The deliciously sweet, smooth sauce I had tried the previous night was totally gone. It was a little sour and unbalanced somehow. It was after midnight and I was tired. All I can think to do is to add a couple of tablespoons of sugar and hope that the flavors just needed time to blend. I put it away and hoped for the best.

The next evening arrived and our friends brought over some amazing cheeses to have as a first course. We have some wine and feast on these for a bit while the chicken is being reheated in the oven. At this point, I’m still hoping all will turn out well. Once it had simmered for a bit, I served the coq au vin with a simple green salad and side of rice flavored with a little garlic and onion. Luckily, I was right. By this point the flavors had mellowed and melded and now had a lovely, savory complexity. *Phew!*

I think the lesson here is the virtue of patience. Once again, the old adage that ‘it will taste better tomorrow’ holds true. It was actually pretty delicious and very tender. Umami galore! However, I have to say, I think I may still tweak the ratio of Cognac to wine a little further. I really loved the extra sweetness from the Cognac before I added the rest of the wine. I also think one could easily get away with less wine. I have since looked at other recipes that use far less wine. Julia Child’s version doesn’t use nearly this much. I ladled heaps of it on to each serving and I still have a large Tupperware’s worth of sauce leftover for future use, which is always nice. However, at the end of the day, the main purpose of using that much wine was to break down and tenderize the tough rooster meat and that probably isn’t as much of a concern for the modern home cook. Finally, this is a dish that seems like it could be easily adapted for the a slow cooker. I foresee future experiments in the works.

But for now . . .

Bon soir! J'espère vous revoir bientôt!