Rooster

Kokoras is a separate ingredient from kotopoulo in Greek cooking rather than a variation on it. An old rooster, or a retired laying hen, has dark, firm, well-worked muscle and far more flavour than a young bird, and it was traditionally killed once it had stopped earning its keep, which meant meat that had to be cooked for hours to be edible at all.

Corfu turns it into kokoras pastitsada: the jointed bird braised in tomato with a cinnamon stick, whole cloves and bay until it falls off the bone, then served over thick bucatini with grated kefalotyri. Kokoras krasatos, the same bird cooked down in red wine, is the mountain version, usually spooned over hilopites so the pasta takes up what the long braise has produced.

Two hours is a starting point rather than a finish, and the sauce matters as much as the meat does. A supermarket chicken can stand in, but it will be ready in forty minutes and the sauce will taste thinner for it. A boiling fowl, or the oldest free-range bird a butcher can supply, is the closest honest substitute available.