Description
This is a relaxed, cook-by-feel Coq au Vin that doesn’t pretend to be precise, but still lands big on flavor. It’s rich, winey, cozy, and forgiving, even if you eyeball half the ingredients and sip wine while cooking.
Ingredients
Scale
- Like 9 or so chicken thighs
- 20ml Olive oil (I think… How much do you need to brown shallots and chicken anyhow?)
- 20ml crushed garlic. Personal opinion? With garlic, more is always better!
- 400ml red wine (this is to go into the dish. How much else you want is up to you).
- 75ml Tomato paste
- 1 tin Tomato & onion mix
- Rosemary
- Salt to taste
- Chicken or Steak & chop spice. Or just a bit more salt if you do not have this stuff or do not like MSG.
- Basil (he’s a good friend of mine, so I always ask him over when we are cooking…. OK, OK, that’s a joke! But I do not know how much basil: just enough to lightly spice the chicken).
- 5 Bay leaves. Note: for those of you phonetically inclined: that is BAY LEAVES, not BAILEY’S: you add it to the food, you do not drink it! Well, feel free to drink whatever you want while you are cooking: this is not an instruction as to WHAT you are supposed to drink.
- 200ml water
- Brown sugar to taste (50ml? Sounds OK to me!)
- 200g smaller button mushrooms. If you cannot find button mushrooms, get larger mushrooms and cut away everything that turns small mushrooms into larger mushrooms. And then use what you cut away as well. Or quarter them if that is easier.
Instructions
- In a large pot, lightly brown/caramelize the shallots in the olive oil. If they are small enough, keep them whole (preferred); otherwise, cut them in half (slightly bigger ones) or quarters (much bigger ones).
- Remove and set aside.
- Brown and spice the chicken thighs in the olive oil in the pot
- When almost done: add garlic
- When garlic is sorta kinda roasted: add red wine, water, tomato paste, tomato & onion mix.… Well, really like everything except the shallots and mushrooms.
- BTW: I boil the water before adding, otherwise it cools everything down, and that isn’t cool.
- Bring the whole shebang to a boil and simmer enthusiastically for 45 minutes. I keep the pot open to facilitate boiling off excess moisture.
- Add shallots and mushrooms. I do this because I do not like mushy shallots/onions and/or mushrooms.
- Simmer for another 30 to 40 minutes. Once again, I keep the pot open to facilitate boiling off excess moisture and get everything nice and concentrated and super tasty.
- Serve with rice and your choice of fresh vegetables.
Notes
Own creation, prepared, tried, and tested Esme’s Husband. Note, I did not modify his writing at all. Midway through our meal, my husband said to me that I did not take a picture, so this represents his plate, already halfway eaten. Luckily, I did manage to get one
