Coq au Vin

This is a favorite dish of French bistro heritage and typically requires several long hours of watchful cooking throughout the day. Some recipes even insist on preparing it in multiple steps, allowing for an overnight rest period. If you use a pressure cooker instead of the usual method, you can convert your chicken of choice into a delightful dish that can be served on its own or with your favorite starch. This dish makes plenty of gravy and you might want to have some fresh French bread to enjoy the rich sauce that will be left on the plate.

Traditional recipes call for a whole chicken, cut into eight pieces and skinned. If you make it with fresh, boneless and skinless chicken found on your store shelves, the time and effort you would normally spend breaking down the whole chicken can be spent enjoying the finished meal. You can also incorporate fresh vegetables in the recipe if wished.

The recipe traditionally calls for fresh herbs, which are my first choice in any recipe, but dried herbs are more likely to be your only choice in the fall and winter months.

Ingredients:

4-5 slices of bacon

4-6 pounds of boneless, skinned chicken

1-2 Tbsp of olive oil

2 cloves of garlic, finely minced

2 cups of thinly sliced leeks If you will be using fresh leeks, be sure that they are thoroughly cleaned

2 Tbsp of dehydrated crosscut celery

1.5 cups of dry, red wine, red cooking wine, or sherry cooking wine

1 cup of water combined with 1 teaspoon of dried chicken bouillon OR 1 cup of canned chicken broth

1 large bay leaf

1/2 Tsp of thyme leaves

1/3 to 1/2 cup of freeze-dried mushrooms

1/3 cup of dehydrated minced onion or 1 pound of small white onions, peeled

2 Tbsp of dried, minced parsley

2 Tbsp of all-purpose flour combined with 2 Tbsp of room-temperature butter

Salt and freshly ground pepper to taste

Directions:

Over medium-low heat, fry the bacon in the pressure cooker without the lid until crispy. Your goal is to render as much of the fat from the bacon as possible. Remove bacon from the pan, drain well, and then crumble and set aside.

Using the bacon fat already in the pan, brown the chicken pieces, making sure to brown each of them on all sides. You may have to do this in batches depending on the size of your pressure cooker. Set aside the chicken when finished browning.

Increase the heat to medium, adding the leeks and garlic to the bacon fat in the pan. Saute them for two to three minutes until soft. Add the celery and cooking wine to the mixture to deglaze the pan, stirring slowly. Be sure to scrape up any bits of leeks and garlic from the bottom of the pan with a wooden spoon as you deglaze it with the cooking wine. This gives added flavor to your dish and prevents the pan from cooking unevenly.

Stir in the chicken stock, bay leaf, thyme, and mushrooms, making sure to coat all of the ingredients evenly. Gently place the chicken on top of the mixture to avoid burning yourself with the hot liquid, and then place the lid on the pressure cooker in accordance with the manufacturer’s instructions.

Increase heat to high. Once a high pressure has been reached, set your timer for nine minutes. When the time has expired, remove the pan from its heat source and release your pressure via the quick-release method being careful not to burn yourself.

Remove the lid with it tilting away from you, and gently remove the chicken pieces with a slotted spoon. Set the chicken aside on a large plate or serving platter.

Remove and discard the bay leaf while increasing the heat to a medium heat. Using the pressure cooker as a regular pot, bring the remaining ingredients to a boil without the lid.

Slowly add the butter and flour mixture until the sauce has thickened, stirring constantly to avoid scorching. This should take about two minutes. Pour about half of the sauce over the chicken and top with the crumbled bacon. Serve with your favorite side dish such as pasta, rice, or potatoes.

Serve the sauce remaining in the pan as an additional gravy if wished.