Coq Au Vin/Chicken with Red Wine (* * * * *)

My fascination with Paris has a tendency to transfer over to the french cuisine. A couple days ago, on an episode of "The Take Home Chef," the meal prepared was "Coq Au Vin." This looked like something I might be able to pull off, so I googled the chef's recipe, then a few others, and settled on one I read about at Simply Recipes.

Coq au vin translates to, "rooster with red wine." The concoction was originally developed as a way to prepare the tough and sinewy meat of an old rooster whose prime had come and gone, by cooking him under a rather long and low heat, until the meat is - "fall off the bone" - tender. The acidity of the wine adds to the process; and the sauce that is produced with bacon, mushrooms, and the wine, is sublime.

Since old roosters are difficult to locate in our modern grocery stores these days, and since most of us don't raise chickens anymore, best used are stew hens, if one can be found. The chicken used for this recipe was neither an old, worn-out, rooster, nor a stewing hen, and it all turned out quite well anyway.

Here it is:

Ingredients

1/2 lb bacon slices
20 pearl onions, peeled, or 1 large yellow onion, sliced
1 chicken, 4 lb, cut into serving pieces, or 3 lbs chicken parts, excess fat trimmed, skin ON
6 garlic cloves, peeled
Salt and pepper to taste
2 cups chicken stock2 cups red wine (pinot noir, burgundy, or zinfandel)
2 bay leaves
Several fresh thyme sprigs
Several fresh parsley sprigs
1/2 lb button mushrooms, trimmed and roughly chopped
2 Tbsp butter
Chopped fresh parsley for garnish

Method

1 Blanch the bacon to remove some of its saltiness. Drop the bacon into a saucepan of cold water, covered by a couple of inches. Bring to a boil, simmer for 5 minutes, drain. Rinse in cold water, pat dry with paper towels. Cut the bacon into 1 inch by 1/4 inch pieces.

2 Brown bacon on medium high heat in a dutch oven big enough to hold the chicken, about 10 minutes. Remove the cooked bacon, set aside. Keep the bacon fat in the pan. Add onions and chicken, skin side down. Brown the chicken well, on all sides, about 10 minutes. Halfway through the browning, add the garlic and sprinkle the chicken with salt and pepper. (Note: it is best to add salt while cooking, not just at the very end. It brings out the flavor of the chicken.)

3 Spoon off any excess fat. Add the chicken stock, wine, and herbs. Add back the bacon. Lower heat to a simmer. Cover and cook for 20 minutes, or until chicken is tender and cooked through. Remove chicken and onions to a separate platter. Remove the bay leaves, herb sprigs, garlic, and discard.

4 Add mushrooms to the remaining liquid and turn the heat to high. Boil quickly and reduce the liquid by three fourths until it becomes thick and saucy. Lower the heat, stir in the butter. Return the chicken and onions to the pan to reheat and coat with sauce. Adjust seasoning. Garnish with parsley and serve.

Serves 4. Serve with potatoes or over egg noodles.

RESULTS: The problem we had was time. You have to start in plenty of time ahead to allow the sauce to reduce down. We had another engagement for 6:30 pm and starting preparing the meal at 4:30. There wasn't enough time to fully reduce the sauce. However, it was delicious! We did have to hurry our meal and that wasn't fun; but we learned about making this dish and will make it again.

NEXT TIME: More time, yes. Brown the chicken in the iron skillet and put the entire chicken in the dutch oven. Browned it this time in the dutch oven and there wasn't enough room for all of it to brown well on the limited bottom surface of the pan. Once a whole chicken is browned, it doesn't matter once it is in the oven because that's when the chicken stock, wine, etc. is added.

A recommendation for a side dish, in addition to the mashed potatoes and steamed carrots is mustard greens. With mashed potatoes the sauce can be ladeled across them. Leftover sauce goes well on pasta for lunch the next day.

Diego's Smoked Cabernet Brisket

Last September we enjoyed some brisket in Branson, MO., that just knocked us out! When we got home I tried twice to smoke some brisket on the charcoal grille we had at the time. If you've ever tried to smoke brisket on a charcoal grille you know exactlly what I mean when I say keeping a constant temperature was a challenge. Six hours of reading the thermometer, opening the lid, dumping more charcoal, adding more wood chips for flavoroing, etc., was a bigger six-hour job than what I wanted.

Day 1:

Now I'm feeling ready to try it again, this time on the new Traeger smoker. I found a recipe at the Walla Walla Village Winery site for a wine inspired smoked brisket, so today I bought a slab of brisket and put together the marinade. I had to modify the recipe some, therefore I gave it a new name, "Diego's Smoked Cabernet Brisket." (I'm a bit partial to the name Diego and like to use when I can, mostly "just in fun.")

The marinade contains the following ingredients: merlot-cabernet wine (Columbia Crest, 2005, merlot-cabernet blend); orange juice, Worcestershire sauce, water, sea salt, fresh ground pepper, crushed garlic cloves, and bay leaves. The meat will be marinated for about 16 hours in the 'fridge.

The BBQ sauce for this masterpiece also calls for merlot-cabernet wine, orange juice, Worcestershire sauce, ketchup, apple cider vinegar, brown sugar, minced ginger, dry mustard powder, red chili flakes, Salt, and Pepper.

More posting tomorrow when we go into full production.

Day 2:

Poured the marinade off the meat this morning, cut slits in the fat side and embedded the garlic, salted and peppered both side. The smoker was turned on a few minutes earlier to set the temperature at 200 to 220 degrees and when ready, placed the meat on the grille and started the timer. This cook should last 7 hours being ready at about 5:30-6:00 pm later today.

We called some friends to join us for brisket, corn on the cob, baked beans and some good red wine later today. Let's hope it all works out.

Here's a closer shot of the meat, fresh off the grille. You can clearly see the slits where the meat was cut about 1/2 inch deep and the garlic inserted.

Our friends, despite being fully informed that we needed them as guinea pigs for this meal, showed up right on time and brought a wonderful bottle of cabernet savignon to go with the brisket; and this beautiful bouquet of flowers...wow.

The wine was superb, smooth, with low acidity and it didn't have that strong oaky taste that so many cabs I've drank have. Of course, I pay bottom dollar for cab, so that may demystify this wonderful bottle they brought.

The brisket was a hit; even though I forgot to add the slices of provolone to the finished product for our guests. We tried the left overs on the next day with the cheese and agreed it didn't really seem to add much to the overall experience of a pretty damned good brisket.

Definitely a repeat recipe!