🐓 au Vin with 🔥

 I'm just little behind but I know you want to see how the Coq au Vin turned out.

Here we go. 

Again, Danyale went on the MtAoFC journey with me. 

We started by watching Julia

Promptly followed by Jamie 

Now fully armed with ALL the information (and perhaps a glass of wine), we dove in. 

First things first, we had to dismember a whole chicken. Let me say that I've NEVER, in my life, dismembered a chicken (or any other animal for that matter). And a more disgusting process I can't imagine. Yes, I've pulled a little bag of giblets (I got ripped off since there was no bag in this chicken) and cooked them for gravy (you know, the whole Thanksgiving thing). 

I'm not as fearless as Julia when it comes to taking apart a 🐓, 🐄, 🐑, 🦞 and so on. The sounds alone were enough to make me NOT want to eat this thing later. 

And this girl didn't finish shaving before arriving at my house. 

After fighting to get this chicken apart, it was time to blanche and saute the lardons. Instead of using bacon, I actually bought bacon ends from the local food coop. So much better. I could have ordered a whole pork belly but glad I didn't (see above about dismemberment). 

Then we browned the chicken (which didn't brown the way I wanted since I took the skin off and I probably crowded the pan - 🤦‍♀️!). While the chicken kinda, sorta browned, it was time to boil the onions to make peeling the skins easier. 

And now we got to play with 🔥. As much as I would like to say that we set things on fire in the most stunning and impressive way.  That didn't happen. The first two tries resulted in nothing. I didn't feel too bad because Jamie had a similar experience (see Jamie & Julia link above). After those failures, I resorted to pouring the booze on while the match was lit. Whoooosh! That worked. 

Now the chicken blushed. A whole bottle of wine into the pot with the chicken and the herb bouquet. 

While the chicken cooked, we finished off the onions and mushrooms (don't crowd the mushrooms). I will fully admit that I somehow read that they needed to be boiled for 10 minutes and forgot all about how I did it with the boeuf bourguignon. It should have been a minute at most. ONE MINUTE! Needless to say, we were puzzled why the onions basically self destructed when we tried peeling them. It was all me. I'll own my mistake. They still tasted good but I won't be forgetting that lesson anytime soon. 

The end result was amazing. Aside from the fact that I never want to dismember a chicken again, I would make this again and again. The sauce is the BEST! Make sure you have a baguette to sop it up because you are gonna wanna do that. You won't want to miss a single drop. 

While we were slightly comatose, I was already looking in the MtAofFC for the next project. 

Postscript: I took this to the bfs this past weekend and he said it was perfect. We had purée de pomme de terre (mashed potatoes) with it. I did invite the younger son to join us and he declined. When he discovered what it was in the morning (apparently his French just isn't), he was disappointed that he passed it up. I took the leftovers with me and Danyale and I polished them off that night. 

More Fancy Pants Chicken

Yup, Danyale and I made some more fancy pants chicken last night.

It was Julia Child's poulet au porto (chicken in port) which required roasting a chicken ahead of time. Which I totally missed that part so had to start that process. Then the chicken that was defrosted in the fridge was stinko. Bleech! Then the question was, 'are we making something or running to the store?' I voted for store, Danyale thought I was nutz to go to the grocery store on a Saturday afternoon. She ain't wrong in that thinking. 

Anyway, we had a plan. I drove. Gave her my cc. She went in to purchase a 3-4lb bird while I readied the car for a quick getaway. 🏎️ It totally worked and we were only delayed about 20 minutes. 

Anyway, after getting the 🐓 in the oven, we watched Jamie cook this dish. 

Then I wondered, what wine should we drink with this and the Google gave me nonsense so I sent a text to Claude for guidance (he was in Miami at the Formula 1 races with the younger son so not joining us on the poulet au porto adventure).

That is the kind of specific answer I needed that Google did NOT provide. Not that I really had any idea what a Sancerre red was but I had plenty of pinot noir and Zinfandel. We busted open the pinot. 

There were then mushrooms and shallots to prep along with letting the chicken rest from the oven. 

Don't crowd the mushrooms!

Did I mention that I bought the port on the way back from a memorial service of one of our band mates yesterday? Well, that happened and I've decided that I shouldn't be trusted in a good liquor store that has many types of port. Or at least, don't let me walk in that section. Very often. 

I say all that because I didn't end up with ONE port but three. Ok, 2 ports and one Maderia. I NEEDED the Maderia since I know that Julia Child will require it in something I'm going to make soon. Guaranteed. And I NEEDED two ports because, well, one is for cooking and one is for drinking. The cooking one was $25 (NOT rotgut stuff) and then I just COULD NOT resist the 20 year Tawny. It was calling my name. So was the 30 year tawny but the $120 price tag stopped me dead in my tracks. So the 20 it was at only $65. 

Now, back to the sauce. With the reasonably priced port. 

The sauce looked and smelled good and got truly interesting when the port went in. Hurray. 

Then it was time for the fire marshall. LOL. No truly, I got to set the deconstructed chicken on 🔥. And if JC could seen the way I took that chicken apart, I know she would have turned in her grave. Oh well, it tasted just fine in that condition.

Now, back to the fire. 

Dump on cognac and get a match! Stand back. Then shake the pan until the flames go out. I think I was a tad impatient for the flames to die down and tried to shut that 💩 down too early. It wasn't done burning! Did I mention that I set the oven mitt on fire? You can watch all the hilarity below or on TikTok. 

After extinguishing the flames without any further mishap, we took the sauteed red potatoes and chicken and enjoyed. And yes, it did go quite nicely with the pinto noir. 

And if you thought I had forgotten about the 20 year tawny, you don't know me very well. Danyale had to bug out after that so I opened the bottle and proceeded to sip away. To say it was heavenly is an understatement and, after tasting that, I WANT to buy the 30 year next time. Maybe if I'm feeling flush that day. 

I'm off to my first class at the meditation center around the corner. I've signed up for the next level of training and looking forward to learning more. I'll spill the tea later.  

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Postscript: I spoke with the bf last night and when he originally saw the text, he didn't REALLY think I would put port in the chicken. As if, 'Port in chicken? What was Julia thinking?' I said, yes I did and yes it was amazing. The plan now is to make Coq au Vin for him this weekend. 🤞

Soup For You

For the next installment of Julia cooking, I choose something simple. Leek and potato soup. Nothing simpler. My friend Danyale has been going on these adventures with me. Here is how the text messages go. 

Ok, so I originally thought I would make garlic and potato soup and then changed my mind. 

And when going on these adventures, I watch either an original Julia video or Jamie and Julia. 

Yes, I do like watching these videos by Jamie.

My friend Kiri was driving through town so I invited her to join us. A bowl of soup and some French bread and we were stuffed. We wiped out the whole batch. No leftovers. 

I text a pic to the bf and his first question was, 'how much cream is in there?' LOL Ok, so yes, there was some but only 3 Tbsp. 

Gotta run!