Coq au Vin

There’s no getting away from it: This is supposed to be a recipe for rooster in wine. I have never seen it that way; you have never seen it that way. It is always made with a regular, no-wattles chicken. My theory is that in some dark dawn of French life, farmers invented this dish as a vehicle for turning old roosters to account. These would have been tough old birds, literally, yeoman soldiers in the sexually lopsided economy of chicken husbandry.

If you have wondered why there ar