After her grandmother dies, a city girl named Katherine travels back to the country for her grandfather's first birthday without his beloved wife. Trying to keep the family together, she decides to follow her grandmother's only tradition of making Coq au Vin every year for her grandfather's birthday. Her pregnant sister is against the idea, because she feels it will just bring up distant memories too awful to bear for their fragile grandfather. She goes against her sister's wishes and decides to make the stew. But making the traditional french stew proves easier said than done, as it requires the fresh meat of an old rooster. Katherine now must follow through and catch a rooster, kill it, and serve it all in time for supper. Katherine has to overcome her fears and keep her fractured family together before all hope is lost.