Weekday Coq Au Vin

Coq au vin (chicken in wine) is typically a slow-cooked, time-consuming dish. You may remember my "Sunday version"... but what if you want coq au vin on a Tuesday? Or Thursday?

I frequently want delicious food mid-week that I didn't have the good sense to prepare on Sunday when I had the time. Yesterday, the weather turned damp and cold and I wanted a nice, hearty chicken dish.

I went to Trader Joe's (one of my favorite stores) and started collecting the ingredients for what I knew would involve chicken, carrots, and wine. I hadn't thought all the way to coq au vin until I tasted their sample of the dish, which (for a frozen heat-and-eat meal) wasn't too shabby.

I was off and running, determined to make a coq au vin as delicious as my Sunday version in under 2 hours. After 15 minutes of prep work, I left my kitchen at 5:30 pm, and could have eaten at 6:30pm. I chose to let the chicken cook an additional 30 minutes while I finished some lesson plans, and everything turned out perfectly. Even better - today I put the dutch oven of leftovers into the oven, and in 20 minutes had dinner ready.


Quick Coq Au Vin

You will need:

chicken pieces, bone in, skin on. I used 2 breasts with rib meat and 4 drumsticks. Use any combination that you like - enough to feed 4 people.

1/2 bottle of French red wine - I prefer bordeaux. Burgundy would work well, too. Don't go too cheap (quality-wise) on the wine (don't cook with wine you wouldn't drink), especially because you are only using half a bottle. Serving the chicken with a glass of the same wine is always a nice touch, and you can get decent table wines for under $10 if you know where to look (like Trader Joe's).

2 - 3 pieces of smoked bacon (I used applewood smoked uncured bacon), diced

1/4 cup pearl onions (frozen)

about 6 oz condensed cream of mushroom soup - I highly highly highly recommend Trader Joe's condensed portabella mushroom soup... the quality is far superior to Campbell's cream of anything.

3 carrots

about 6 small red potatoes

salt and pepper


Preheat oven to 375.
Salt and pepper chicken generously.
Over medium-high heat, warm some olive oil in the bottom of a dutch oven. Place as many pieces of chicken as you can without them touching into the pan to brown. Turn the chicken once and then remove to a plate, cooking the second batch (or however many more you have to brown all the chicken). You just need it in there long enough to brown up the skin a bit, not to cook the chicken. While the chicken browns, dice up your bacon, clean and cut the carrots into large pieces, and quarter the potatoes. (Reserve carrots and potatoes for later - you won't actually need them until about 30 minutes before eating.)

Once the chicken is brown and removed from the pan, saute the bacon. Once done, drain the pan and add the chicken, onions, cream of mushroom soup, and wine. Cover and put it into the oven.

Cook for 30 minutes. After 30 minutes (or 30 minutes before you would like to eat - this can cook for as long as you like) add in the carrots and potatoes.


That is it. Coq au vin in under 2 hours.
You can serve this over egg noodles if you wish, but it is delicious and filling as-is.
Either way, enjoy!