Cockscomb ✦

Crête de coq

What it is

There is no meat in it at all — a comb is skin and collagen, and a long enough cooking turns it translucent and yielding, a texture nothing else on a French menu provides. Escoffier lists it in the financière and in the garnished capon; it went out with the dishes, not with the taste.

In the kitchen

Rub them in coarse salt while still warm from a brief blanch and the outer skin comes away on its own — that skin is the only bitter part. Then four hours at the barest simmer in white stock; under three they stay rubbery.

Goes with

Chicken Butter Malmsey Madeira Morel Cockerel testicles White pepper

Same species

Egg white powder (albumin) Chicken tail (bonjiri) Bresse chicken Capon Chicken Rooster

Something wrong here, or missing? Tell us