Member-only story
Coq au Vin
French Soul Food
Each of us has our own personal “soul food”. As much as I love collards, ham hocks, and cornbread — that is not what I am talking about necessarily. I am talking about a dish that touches your soul in such a profound and real way. I am resisting using the overused phrase “soul-satisfying” (can we agree to bury that right next to curated and world-class?) because that is not quite right either. What is soulful to me, may not be for you.
Coq au Vin is my personal soul food. I started making the current round of coq au vin 4 or 5 days ago. Coq au vin is a dish better suited to preparing at a grandmotherly pace. Like all great stews, it is better done slowly over a longer period of time to allow the full flavors to develop and mature. Coq au Vin is best prepared at home, where it retains the patina of its origins, rather than in a restaurant setting, where it dies a soulless death.
Today, on this glorious wet, cloudy grey day, we cracked open an old bottle of a Chateau Neuf du Pape we had been saving for just the right dish. Edith blared from our tiny speakers (Padam Padam). The coq au vin lay on a set of plates that had been in my family for hundreds of years—the last 2 of their kind. Served with a rich puree of potatoes, I lost myself in an eternity of thought.
