Coq of the walk:Sometimes you just can't beat the classics, writes Hugo Arnold
We had coq au vin the other night. It seemed an extravagance to use such a lot of wine for it - but then we tasted the rich, reviving sauce.
It's one of those dishes that have been reinvented to within a centimetre of their lives yet still come out best when they are cooked traditionally.
Beef stroganoff is another one. It was almost a staple when I was a student, providing hints of both the exotic, with its paprika, and luxury, with its sour cream. As it's a doddle to make it appeared more weekends than I care to remember. Or what about filling the house with the comforting smell of a creamy fish pie?
Best of all has been a return, at lunch, to soup with home-made garlic bread, baked in foil as a soft, buttery reminder of the 1960s and 1970s, when it seemed so cool. Or was it just, then as now, that we loved its indulgent warmth?
Recipes serve four
COQ AU VIN
1 bottle Burgundy
2 cloves
1 star anise
½ stick cinnamon
2 bay leaves
1 sprig thyme
1 onion, halved
2 sticks celery
1 carrot, roughly chopped
4 chicken legs (drumsticks and thighs)
1 tbsp plain flour
olive oil
4 slices pancetta, cut into lardons
24 button onions, peeled
24 button mushrooms
small glass brandy
Pour the wine into a saucepan, then add the spices, bay leaves, thyme, onion, celery and carrot and reduce the liquid by half. This should take 20-30 minutes. Strain and reserve.
Remove the skin from the chicken and separate each leg and thigh. Season the flour generously with salt and pepper and saute in three tablespoons of olive oil over a gentle heat until just coloured. Turn over and repeat on the other side. Remove and set aside.
Add the pancetta to the pan and cook over a low heat for two minutes. Add the onions and mushrooms and continue to cook until slightly coloured - about five minutes.
Return the chicken to the pan and pour in the brandy. Set alight and, when the flames die down, pour in the reduced wine. Season with salt and pepper. Cook over the lowest heat for 45 minutes or in a low oven, 150 degrees/gas three, for an hour uncovered.
Remove the chicken and vegetables and reduce the sauce for 10-15 minutes. Combine everything together again and serve with boiled or mashed potatoes.
FISH PIE
500g floury potatoes, peeled and roughly chopped
1 onion, peeled and finely sliced
bunch parsley, finely chopped, stalks reserved
1 bay leaf
1 stick celery, roughly chopped
500ml full-cream milk
300g smoked haddock
300g cod
20g flour
60g butter plus a little extra
3 eggs, hard-boiled
4 scallops, halved
Put the potatoes in cold salted water and bring to the boil. Simmer until tender - 15 to 20 minutes - then drain and mash.
Put the onion, parsley stalks, bay leaf, celery and milk in a pan. Lower in the fish, bring to the boil and simmer for three minutes, or until it is just cooked. Remove the fish and set aside. Reserve the milk.
Preheat the oven to 180 degrees/gas four. Combine the flour and 20g of the butter in a saucepan and cook over a low heat for a minute. Add half the reserved milk and stir until you have a thick sauce. Season.
Roughly flake the fish into a shallow ovenproof dish. Remove the shells from the eggs and halve. Add to the fish with the scallops. Season the fish, scallops and eggs. Add the chopped parsley to the sauce, stir and pour over the fish, scallops and eggs.
Combine the mashed potato with the remaining 40g of butter. Whisk in most of the remaining milk - you may not need all of it - to give a creamy but firm consistency. Spread over the fish mixture and dot with a little of the extra butter. Bake for 30-40 minutes or until golden and bubbling.
BEEF STROGANOFF
600g sirloin steak
50g butter
2 onions, peeled and thinly sliced
1 tbsp good sweet paprika
35 button mushrooms, sliced
2 tbsp vegetable oil
250ml soured cream
juice of 1 lemon
Cut the sirloin into thin strips. Melt the butter in a large frying pan with the vegetable oil. Add the onion and cook slowly over a moderate heat for 10 minutes, or until softened. Add the paprika - the secret of this dish is to use a good brand, from a delicatessen rather than a supermarket - and mushrooms and cook for five more minutes, stirring frequently. Remove from the pan and reserve.
Heat a tablespoon of oil in the pan. Season the beef well with salt and pepper and fry half of it over a high heat - you want it to cook quickly rather than stew. Add to the onion mixture. Put another tablespoon of oil and the remaining meat in the pan. Finish as before.
Return the first batch of meat, along with the onion mixture, to the pan. Add the cream and lemon juice, bring to the boil, simmer for a minute, to combine the flavours, and serve.