Sunday Gravy with yeah right: For Julia Child. Coq Au Vin!

Good morning and happy midsummer morning to you all.

We’ve had a relatively friendly start to the summer heatwise but we’re still dealing with the fucking idiots who think that every day in July is the 4th and they are STILL setting off fireworks.

This fucking town and their fireworks man.

I’m in one of those stretches where it’s between major holidays and also still 3 months until vacation so this is where I find myself saying the current day and year out loud while I’m sitting stuck in traffic on the 405. “It’s fucking July 13th 2025 goddammit!”

I’m also counting down the end of my 45 year work sentence daily now. In fact today is officially 3 years, 3 months and 10 days before I can skedaddle up out of this bitch. Again it could be 1 year 3 months and 10 days based on financial performance but that remains to be seen.

These summer months are a goddamn grind between the 4th of July and Labor Day and the fact that it’s summer sure as SHIT doesn’t help that out.

We do have rookies reporting to training camp, some as early as this week so we’re getting there with regards to our beloved football. Try and stay focused on that instead.

Our menu today does require some oven time and a small amount of reheating time but it’s not unbearable in the kitchen so it should be fine.

Once again the brutal part of summer doesn’t hit LA until late September or even early October so we’ve got some time to fuck around with oven cooking still.

Ready to get after this fucker?

Just know it’s best not to be hungry when you start on this recipe. I began the first part on Friday and dinner was served on Sunday. Yes. Three goddamn days to prep.

[Quick edit- this is awkward but I had this episode cooked, devoured, basic outline for the post in place then remembered that we’d cooked a Julia Child recipe before. I like to link to previous related posts so I went to the search feature. We DID do a Julia Child recipe before. Coq au van. Yes. THIS DISH! In my defense it was real early on in the pandemic, everything was weird as shit and I’ve purged a lot of those memories. Fuck it. Let’s press on as if nothing happened. This IS a different recipe though!]

We are going to pay homage once again to le grande dame Julia Child by making one of her most famous recipes, Coq Au Vin. Literally meaning “Cock in wine.” Yes there may be several gratuitous Coq jokes to follow.

recipe courtesy of recipetineats.com

Coq Au Vin!

Red Wine Chicken Marinade:

2 pounds chicken thighs or drumsticks

16 pearl onions

1 bay leaf 

3 thyme sprigs (sub 1 tsp dried thyme)

750 ml / 3 cups red wine

Browning Chicken:

3 – 4 tbsp vegetable oil (or canola oil)

3/4 tsp salt (cooking/kosher salt, or 1/2 tsp table salt)

1/2 tsp pepper

Coq au Vin Stew:

 5 oz bacon piece cut into lardons

14 oz white mushrooms sliced

4 tbsp unsalted butter

3 garlic cloves minced

2 tbsp tomato paste

7 tbsp flour, plain / all purpose

 3 cups beef stock

1/4 tsp salt

1/4 tsp black pepper

Let’s start with the vin.

A Bordeaux this time. This was a delicious bottle of wine by the way. I’ll keep an eye out for it but it would be special occasion only due to its price point.

Now for the “Coq.”

You are correct! We’re definitely getting some serious miles from the chicken thighs. And we ain’t done yet! Keep your eyes open for their use on future episodes too.

I might be fully off of the chicken breast wagon permanently. It’s basically just a big wad of protein with minimal flavor.

Eh, I’ll think about it when I give a shit.

We’ll also be requiring some pearl onions today. If you’ve ever cooked with them you know what that means.

Side note: These little bastards aren’t easy to find in the store anymore. If you don’t see them in the produce department, look in the frozen food section. SOMETIMES you’ll find them there already peeled and everything. I tried 3 stores before I found these. At Whole Foods along with the price to match the purchasing location.

If you’ve fucked with these before then you are aware of the challenge you will face attempting to peel these tiny little motherfuckers.

That’s why we’re here. There IS a simple way to make your life a whole lot less goddamn frustrating in that whole “Peeling a pearl onion” life aspect.

Trim the ends first.

Yep. All of them.

These will blanche real quick – maybe a minute –  in boiling water then dump them in an ice bath to stop the cooking.

Let cool a moment then peel them easy as motherfucking pie.

Cool shit that. Wish I had learned that the first dozen times I cooked with these tricky bastards.

Next we will create our simple wine marinade by adding the wine, onions, bay leaf and thyme to a plastic bag then dumping in the rinsed and dried chicken thighs into the marinade. Refrigerate overnight.

Next day remove the chicken from the marinade, reserving the marinade and let the chicken dry on some paper towels.

Anyone remember this game?

Yeah, this whole next sequence of meal prep will fit that general visual theme

Remove the onions from the marinade bag and set aside.

Yes, those are spectacularly awesome bloody eyeballs too.

Reserve the marinade because we’re gonna reduce that shit by half.

Careful this shit will bubble over like a motherfucker. You’ve been warned.

When the wine is reduced set to the side.

Let’s start browning shit!

Pour the cooking oil in a large pot or Dutch oven over a medium heat.

Salt and pepper the fully dried chicken. Use a paper towel to remove the last of the dampness, then we will brown the chicken in batches for about 3-5 minutes per side.

Then flip.

Chicken is browned, then it’s time to get after that bacon. Same pot.

When the bacon has been crisped set it aside with the chicken.

Mushrooms are next.

Yessir! Right in the bacon fat. Get them nice and golden.

Then we will saute the onions.

It’s like a goddamn assembly line in here.

See? It’s not a difficult recipe but there is some fucking assembly required. Jesus!

Next we got your butter, garlic and tomato paste.

In goes the flour, reduced wine and beef stock.

Pretend you’re making a gravy here – because you ARE! Add the beef stock slowly and keep on stirring.

Finally!

Get EVERYTHING back in the pot.

Slap a lid on that Coq-sucker!

This will cook in a preheated 375 degree oven for 30 minutes. That’s right! Just thirty minutes.

When done, remove the pot from the oven and let cool, then refrigerate overnight.

That’s right fuckers. Three day prep!

Next day, I was busy cooking my weekly soup so the pot we used to cook the chicken in was occupied.

Which meant…

Those fucking things, man!

I figured “No big deal. It’s just got to warm up. It will be fine. Right?”

Wrong.

Motherfucker took so goddamn long to warm up, it caused my gravy to separate.

Look!

First of all this was absolutely, diabolically fucking delicious. Just insanely awesome. As you can see I served the coq over some mashed potatoes.

That goddamn crockpot unsexied the FUCK out of that photo.

Sonofabitch the goddamn Crockpot Strikes Back!

My conclusion is that crockpots are assholes. They’re only good for shitting things out and everybody has one.

Looks aside, this dish is epic. Fuck it better be. My dumb ass has cooked and shared it twice! I might have to do like a couple of our regular feature writers, Sharky and Rikki and start using a spreadsheet.

Fuck that! I use enough fucking Excel at work I don’t need it infringing on my goddamn leisure time!

The quality of this dish is greatly enhanced by first, the quality of the wine used. Very important for this. Secondly, that extra day of letting it rest in the refrigerator is HUGE, Really helps meld the flavors together.

This is a killer dish and there’s a very good reason it’s been around as long as it has and is still as popular as ever.

This week’s “fun” holidays courtesy of A Bit of Good News: “

July 13 is International Skinny Dip Day, National Barbershop Music Appreciation Day, National Beans ‘n Franks Day, National Nitrogen Ice Cream Day, National Rock Day, Embrace Your Geekness Day and Rubik’s Cube Day.”

So I guess your mission is to have some beans and franks followed by skinny dipping while listening to a barbershop quartet. Sounded good until that last part.

Thanks as always folks. I fully appreciate you taking time away from your Sunday to spend some time here. It really means a lot to me.

Thank you.

So? Next week we do this thing again?

No not cooking coq au vin again, just the Sunday Gravy thing.

Cool. See you then.