Cooking
This iconic French recipe marries two main ingredients: the coq (rooster) and vin (wine). Although traditionally made with rooster, it is most often made with chicken nowadays, accompanied by lardons, mushrooms, garlic, herbs and wine, of course.
The chicken is cut into pieces (or you can use chicken thighs like I did) and marinated in wine, oil, pepper, parsley, bay leaves and thyme for 12 hours.
If you’re not using rooster, the recipe specifies a “poulet fermier”, a free-free range chicken, as only the best will do. I’ve noticed these sorts of terms creeping into English recipes as well, attempting to influence the quality of the ingredients. An example is specifying free range eggs, organic products or kosher salt (particularly in American recipes), which has larger flakes than normal salt and is less likely to contain additives.
First the lardons are boiled for a few minutes, then fried with the onions until golden. The chicken is then fried a little, before adding the wine, herbs and garlic and then left to simmer. Lastly the mushrooms are added near the end and the sauce is thickened with a white sauce before serving.
Traditionally the rooster’s blood was also added and my recipe boldly includes this as an option. Not the most appetising of ingredients and an English audience would be hard-pressed to find some rooster or chicken blood to add.
Translation
Onions
The recipe calls for a whopping 24 ‘small’ onions. I don’t know about you but I wouldn’t ever think to keep 24 onions in my house, let alone put them in one dish. After further research it became apparent that pearl onions are the onion of choice for coq au vin. Known for their sweet, delicate flavour, they make the ideal ingredient for this dish. Read more about the different kinds of onions and their uses here.
Bouquet garni
Bouquet garni is a French term also used in English sometimes to mean a bundle of herbs that is added to dishes that require a long simmer, such as casseroles, stocks and soups. Research tells me that they tend to include thyme, bay leaves and parsley, which is corroborated later on in the recipe specifies that these should be added.
Les égoutter
Literally ‘drain’, here it refers to dabbing the fried lardons with kitchen roll to remove the oil. Unless we are deep frying we rarely use enough oil for it to constitute draining.
Beurre manié
Near the end, the recipe calls for you to prepare a “beurre manié“, literally a kneaded butter. It is a sauce similar to a roux (another type of white sauce) in that is equal parts of butter and flour and is used to chicken soups and sauces. The difference lies in the fact that for a beurre manié the flour and butter are mixed together at room temperature and added to the dish uncooked, whereas for a roux the ingredients are mixed together over a low heat. “And what about béchamel sauce?” I hear you cry. That is a roux with milk added to it. Who knew there were so many types of white sauce?
The beurre manié was used to thicken the dish, so in a hurry, some corn flour would suffice.
We are the champignons (of Paris)
The recipe requests “champignons de Paris”, i.e. Parisian mushrooms. It appears these are simply button mushrooms.
Verdict
Not my favourite of recipes I have to say. My recipe boasts 1 litre of red wine, which in hindsight was probably too much, given the rich flavour of the dish. I wouldn’t be in a hurry to make this again, although I would like to try a professional restaurant version to see if I can be persuaded otherwise.