Mediterranean Style Coq au Vin

I made the classic French peasant recipe Coq au Vin two or three times, and somehow for a dish that is really pretty simple, it seemed complicated with a lot of individual cooking steps. It's a good recipe if made correctly, but it becomes a sort of mediocre recipe if you cut corners, which I did the last time around. I am including the classic Coq au Vin recipe in this posting so I have it on file. But the headliner of this posting is a dish that I conjured up, looking for something similar to Coq au Vin in style, but with a lot fewer steps, and a lighter, summertime flavor.

Thus, I came up with a chicken dish that uses white wine instead of red, fresh Rosemary, fresh tomatoes, capers and Kalamata olives, the latter of which inspired me to call this Mediterranean Style Coq au Vin. (Click here to learn more about Kalamata olives).

I realize the name of my recipe is something of a misnomer, if not redundant, since the south of France is bordered by the Mediterranean Sea. But I wanted a good, descriptive name with a distinction between the heavier dish that originated in the central French wine growing region of Bordeaux, and my recipe, which evokes images and flavors from Cyprus, Crete and the Grecian Isles.

The first time I ever had the classic version of Coq au Vin, I had been invited to a colleague's home for dinner. He was Swiss and spoke English, French and German. He had been educated at École Hôtelière de Lausanne, the oldest hotel school in the world, and had a background in the culinary arts. He knew practically everything there was to know about wine and was a great cook.

As I recall the event, dinner was just great. I had never had chicken so expertly prepared with such a depth and richness of flavor. To top off the meal, he prepared a classic, homey French farmhouse dessert called Îles Flottantes, or "Floating Islands," which are puffy clouds of softly poached meringue floating on a vanilla custard sauce. And of course, his dinner and dessert wine selections were sublime.

I recall that it was a chilly time of year in Atlanta, and because he didn't have room in his refrigerator to bring the Floating Islands down to their proper temperature, he put them outside on his patio deck, so that the cool night air would chill the meringue to its proper temperature before serving. It's sort of strange the things our memory latches onto, isn't it?

Fast forward many years later, and I made Coq au Vin after having my memories of this dinner rekindled while seeing it prepared on the Food Network and Alton Brown's Good Eats, which might explain my perception that this recipe has too many steps for being such a relatively simple recipe. Alton just complicates the hell out of everything. Plus, I had to listen to him unveil the recipe with an insufferable French accent while wearing a stupid French beret.

Accordingly, when I was actually ready to try the recipe for myself, Alton Brown be damned, and I turned to the quintessential French Chef, Julia Child, for this quintessential French recipe. I provide Julia's version below verbatim from her original 1968 book, The French Chef. One look at its length, however, and you'll understand why I was looking for something decidedly simpler and quicker to prepare.

To be clear, my recipe here is not an interpretation of the classic French Coq au Vin recipe. Mine is an altogether different approach, but the concept is the same. Mediterranean Style Coq au Vin is sauteed chicken with aromatic herbs and vegetables simmered in a wine sauce. My dish is lighter and easier to prepare than the mother recipe, and it's just delicious served over rice. You can use any pieces of chicken you like, but I personally think that dark meat is better for stewing than white meat, so my recipe calls for legs and thighs.

Ingredients
4 each chicken legs and thighs
2 tbsp garlic, minced
1 large onion, finely diced
8 oz fresh mushrooms, sliced
6 medium fresh tomatoes, cut into quarters or sixths
1/2 cup pitted Kalamata olives
1/2 3.5 oz jar nonpareil capers, drained (like, Crosse & Blackwell)
4-5 sprigs fresh rosemary, intact
3-4 cups dry white wine
1 cup chicken stock (like Swanson's or Kitchen Basics)
4 tbsp olive oil
2 tbsp butter
salt & pepper to taste

The Recipe
In a large Dutch oven, heat the olive oil until shimmering. Season the chicken pieces with salt and pepper and rub the minced garlic all over them.

Starting skin side down, carefully place the chicken into the hot oil, and mind the heat so you don't burn the garlic. Don't over-crowd the chicken, or you'll end up steaming the chicken pieces rather than sauteing them. Cook the chicken until browned, about 6-8 minutes per side.

Remove the chicken pieces to a platter and allow any juices to accumulate.

Add a bit more olive oil if needed and saute the onion first, then melt the butter into the onions and add the mushrooms. Cook until all are beginning to caramelize, but not crispy, about fifteen minutes.

When the onions and mushrooms are browned, pour about half a cup of the white wine into the Dutch oven, and using your spatula, scrape up all of the crusty brown bits into the mixture.

Return the chicken and any accumulated juices to the Dutch oven and add the tomatoes, olives and capers. Pour in the chicken stock and enough of the white wine to completely cover the chicken and everything else, plus a quarter-inch.

Submerge the whole, intact rosemary sprigs into the broth. Test for seasoning and add more salt and pepper if needed. Bring everything to a soft simmer.

Cook the chicken uncovered about an hour until it is fork tender. Cooking uncovered will allow the broth to reduce a bit, concentrating the flavors. When the chicken is done, remove the whole sprigs of rosemary and discard before serving. Serve in a large pasta bowl over white rice, with lots of broth.

As a footnote to this recipe, I have tried the rosemary several different ways. Originally, I took fresh rosemary needles off their stem, and put them in the broth whole. Then I tried chopping them. I also tried dried rosemary. I finally came to the conclusion that the needles were a distraction when eating this dish. So, leaving the rosemary intact, cooking them in the broth, and then removing them before serving worked perfectly. They render all their aroma and flavor, but none of the needles stay behind to detract from the rest of the ingredients.

Now, here is Julia Child's version of Coq au Vin, verbatim, from her 1968 recipe, which was a printed recreation from her thirty-eighth show The French Chef, aired sometime in late 1962 or early 1963:

Coq au vin is probably the most famous of all French chicken dishes, and certainly one of the most delicious, with its rich red-wine sauce, its tender onion and mushroom garniture, and its browned pieces of chicken with wonderful flavor. Ideal for a party because you may prepare it completely a day or more before serving, coq au vin seems to be even better when done ahead so all its elements have time to steep together.

COQ AU VIN
(Casserole of Chicken in Red Wine, Garnished with Onions, Mushrooms and Bacon)
For 4-6 people

THE BACON
A 3- to 4 ounce chunk of lean bacon
A 10-inch flameproof casserole or an electric skillet
2 Tb cooking oil

Remove rind and cut bacon into sticks 1 inch long and 1/4 inch across. Simmer for ten minutes in 2 quarts of water, drain, rinse in cold water, and dry. Saute slowly in the casserole (260 degrees for the electric skillet) with the oil. When bacon is very lightly browned, remove to a side dish, leaving fat in pan.

BROWNING THE CHICKEN
2-1/2 to 3 lb. cut up frying chicken
1/2 tsp salt
1/8 tsp pepper
1/4 cup cognac

Dry chicken thoroughly in a towel. Brown on all sides in the hot fat (360 degrees). Season chicken with salt and pepper, return bacon to pan, cover pan, and cook slowly (300 degrees) for ten minutes, turning chicken once. Then uncover, pour in cognac, ignite with a lighted match. Shake pan back and forth for several seconds until flames subside.

[Editorial Comment: Clearly written before everyone was so damn conscious of litigation because stupid people would read directions like this and not take appropriate caution, like taking the pan off any open flame if using a gas stove, and always having a fire extinguisher under the stove as a permanent kitchen appliance, just in case.]

SIMMERING IN RED WINE
3 cups Burgundy, Macon, Chianti or California Mountain Red wine
1 to 2 cups beef stock or bouillon
1 tb tomato paste
2 cloves mashed garlic
1 bay leaf

Pour wine into pan, and add just enough bouillon to cover the chicken. Stir in tomato paste, garlic, and herbs. Bring to the simmer, then cover and simmer slowly for about thirty minutes, or until the chicken meat is tender when pierced with a fork.

THE ONIONS
12 to 24 small white onions
Salt to taste
1 to 2 tb cooking oil

While chicken is cooking, drop onions into boiling water, bring water back to the boil, and let boil for 1 minute. Drain, shave off two ends of onions, peel carefully, and pierce a deep cross in the root end with a small knife (too keep onions whole during cooking). Heat oil in a frying pan, add onions, and toss for several minutes until lightly browned (this will be a patchy brown). Add water to halfway up onions and 1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon salt, cover pan, and simmer slowly for 25 to 30 minutes, or until onions are tender when pierced with a knife.

THE MUSHROOMS
1/2 lb. fresh mushrooms
1 tb butter
1/2 tb cooking oil

Trim base of mushroom stems, remove base from stems, wash stems and caps rapidly in cold water and dry in a towel. Cut caps into quarters, stems into bias chunks (to resemble, roughly, the cut caps). Heat butter and oil in frying pan; when bubbling hot, toss in mushrooms and saute over high heat for 4 or 5 minutes until lightly browned.

SAUCE AND SERVING
3 tb flour
2 tb softened butter

When chicken is done, drain out cooking liquid into a sauce pan. Skim off and boil down liquid, if necessary, to concentrate flavor. You should have about 2-1/4 cups. Remove from heat. Blend butter and flour together in a saucer; beat into the cooking liquid with a wire whip. Bring to the simmer, stirring, and simmer for a minute until sauce has thickened. Scrape onions and mushrooms into sauce and simmer a minute to blend flavors. Carefully taste sauce, adding more salt and pepper if you feel it necessary. Then pour sauce over chicken. (Chicken is now ready for final reheating, but can be set aside until cool, then covered and refrigerated for a day or two.)

Shortly before serving, bring to the simmer, basting chicken with sauce. Cover and simmer slowly for 4 or 5 minutes, until chicken is hot through. (Do not overcook at this point!)

Serve from casserole, or arrange on a hot platter and decorate with sprigs of parsley.

Accompany with parsley potatoes, rice, or noodles; buttered green peas or a green salad; hot French bread; and the same red wine you used for cooking the chicken.

I find it interesting that Julia's writing style frequently eliminates the use of articles like "a" and "the." "Shake pan back and forth..." or "Heat butter and oil in frying pan..." as examples, have a certain rigid sound to them, sort of like the way robots and computers talked as depicted in '50s and '60s science fiction movies and TV shows. That also seems to be the style of writing in many recipe books of that era. I'm not sure I understand what is so verbose about saying "Shake the pan," or "Heat the butter and oil in a frying pan."

I also note that when this recipe was written, California wine from Napa or Sonoma Valleys had clearly not taken root yet. I am not at all sure what "California Mountain Red wine" is, but you won't find any such thing at your neighbor liquor store anymore. Thus, a California Merlot, Cabernet or Zinfandel would work perfectly with Julia's recipe.