Creamy Chicken Tarragon, a la Jacques Pépin | KQED

You know, the best way to recognize a good cook is to look at someone working in the kitchen, how efficient people are. I always recognize great cooks this way. I remember when I was a child, from my aunt to my mother and all that, there was a great economy in the kitchen. Economy not only in the dish itself, economy of motion, of moving and so forth. And this is often what makes great cooks, much more than other decorated plates and so forth. And today we're going to emphasize budget, I mean economy in the kitchen. The way the student had asked to do it, to survive, you know. And with the chicken here, we're going to do three different dishes. The first thing, of course, is to bone out the chicken. And I'm going to remove some of the fat that we are not going to use here. And remove the leg. Again, I lift up the chicken so that I cut the skin and I use the weight of the chicken to do this. Cut the little oyster here. Bring the chicken leg forward and break it open. Cut at the joint. That's it. And pull out. Remove the chicken. Same way on the other side. You cut the skin, the oyster, bring it back up to crack it open. Cut through the sinew. Now I have my two legs. Now I have the two wings. This is going to go in our fricassee. That we can cut into pieces right here. Right. And now, of course, the more tender part of the chicken, which is the breast. First covered with that layer of skin. And that layer of skin, we are going to use it also, or some of it at least. Cut between, just next to the bone here. Grab the meat at the end here and pull on it again to get that breast of chicken. So what we want to do in that dish, we want first to separate the meat from the bone and the skin. So this is the two breasts. This is the bone. That's part of the bone. Again, here, I'm cutting the drumstick and the thigh. Again, removing the skin. You can use a towel for that. Makes it easier. Here, that's part of our meat. I could bone this out also, but I mean, we're going to leave the bone in. Again, here. And the drumstick. This way. And this way, I'm going to cut the end of the drumstick, actually. I need the bone here also. That's it. This is the meat. This is the bone. The bone has to be cut in smaller pieces also. Use a large, sturdy knife, you know. And notice that I'm using the back of the knife. This way. And some of the skin here. Now, some of the skin, we cut it into little dice like that to do crackling, you know. We're going to do a little bit of crackling with that skin. Actually, this is what I'm showing you now. So we'll take basically most of the skin to cut it into pieces like this. And what happens to it after, I put it to cook right here on the stove. And as you can see, this one, the crackling is about done here. Then those bones here go into that large saucepan and fry by themselves to do our second dish, which is a fricassee of chicken with brown rice, you know. And third, what we are doing is the meat. The choice of spot right here. That we are going to do a chicken with cream sauce and fricassee with it. So, the first thing that we'll do is to start cooking that chicken. However, you know that the dark meat will cook much faster than the white meat. Or this one, actually, if you cook too long, it's going to get dry and fiber. So what we'll do in this, we put the dark meat first. Now, notice here we have no fat or anything like this. We put about half a cup of chicken stock in it. About a cup of white wine in there. And into this, we have some onion, bay leaf, and thyme. And this is the seasoning for the chicken first. About three ounces of onion for one chicken. This would be about enough. So what we are doing today is not really a menu. I mean, you would not want to serve those three dishes together. But those emphasize economy in the kitchen, and that's what I want to show you today. So that goes with it. We put it on. I put a dash of salt in this. It has to come to a strong boil. And it boils about seven, eight minutes for the dark meat to be partially cooked. Then we put the white meat in it for another five, six minutes to finish both together. So I'll put that here. Meanwhile, I want to start the soup. As you can see here, I have that crackling. And maybe it is a bit too much fat in there, which has been rendered. So I will pour out most of the fat and leave like one tablespoon or so of fat. And on top of this, we're going to sauté the onion. I have the soup here. I have a large onion. I have some garlic. I have some herb, herb de Provence, a mixture of herbs, and split peas, which have been washed. Those split peas, of course, are very high in soluble fiber, and it's quite good. So let's first sauté the onion. You know, if you have a large saucepan, if you have a large saucepan to do your soup, a large souppan, you can render your fat directly, I mean the skin, you can render it directly into your souppan. Then you put your onion, then you put the garlic and so forth, and you don't have to dirty another pan that I have here. Okay, here it is. So I sauté this a little bit. Garlic to it. Separate the head of garlic by heating it on the side. A couple of cloves here that I have in there, and that's going to go into our soup. It doesn't have to be very finely chopped, just coarsely crushed like this. Maybe another one. Going to cook a long time. We have the herbes de Provence there on top of the seasoning. Can put my salt even now. Everything here, and basically we have all of our ingredients here for the soup. Like this. Put that into a large stockpot. The split peas. Cold water on top of it. Bring that to a boil. You want to bring that to a boil, and you want to simmer it gently. So this is out of the way. Now we can move on to the third dish, which is the fricassee. And the fricassee here, we are doing it with brown rice, which has a lot of fiber, also a tiny type of brown rice. But as you can see, and that's what's important, if the crystallization of the juice and how brown those are, that will give you a lot of taste. No, there wasn't that much fat in there. Remember, most of the bone and the skin was taken out. So we're going to start with the onion again here, sautéing a bit of onion in the fat. You see, with a little bit of imagination, you can really do a lot. And if you decide that you only want to do, for example, that type of dish, you go to the supermarket and you buy a package of chicken back and neck and just brown it and start that dish with rice. You can really feed a large family with a little bit of food. I have some garlic and some jalapeno pepper here. Now, mix that well. Then I put the rice in it. And I have olives here, all chopped olives. Now, if you feel the olives are too expensive, then omit them. And I have muscat raisins. Those are dry, large raisins. Again, you can replace with another type of raisins or fig or whatever you want. It doesn't have to be this. We have some cilantro, which is that spicy type of Chinese parsley, so-called, sometimes Japanese parsley. Then, one large olive or a little can of olive if you don't have fresh, a little can of tomato if you don't have the fresh tomato. We mix that together. And finally, the water. Remember, you put approximately half of the amount of water. I mean, double the amount of water than rice. You have a cup of rice, two cups of water. We bring that to a boil. You know, it's important. Then, we are going to cover it. I think I put the lid somewhere here. Bring it to a boil. That has to cook for about 15 minutes. And talking about this, I think that the leg of chicken has been cooking for a while, so I'll put the breast to finish with them in that liquid here. Another 8-10 minutes. And during that time, I can serve the soup. I have another soup here, which is cooked, that I did before. Very simply done. And again, in our budget, you know, I have some leftover bread. You slice your leftover bread and make croutons. That's going to go well with your soup here. So, here is our soup, which is quite thick, you know. And our recipe is for four. And believe me, this is plenty for four of that thick, heavy split soup with croutons. And this is terrific. That can make a whole meal in itself. You know, economy is so important in the kitchen, as we know. But who knows more than the student? And who knows more than my daughter? Claudine, who goes to school, just finished at Boston University. So, what did you bring here? Well, I brought all of this stuff from my refrigerator because it went bad. And I don't know what to do with it, and I don't want to waste it. Because I don't have enough money to waste it. You know what I do? I go to the supermarket. I go at the end of the supermarket to buy things like this. Because I buy it for a fraction of the price. You have to open it. This is perfectly fine inside. If you do a coleslaw or anything like this, I mean, this is nice and beautiful. And this is what you have to look at inside. I mean, look at that leak here. Yeah, but how do you know it's not all rotten? That's a good point. Well, you have to, you know, it's firm. Touch it, you know. And you can open this a little bit and see that, except for that first leaf, which looks really terrible. Maybe the second one. Maybe the third one by the time you get here. You know, you cut it this way, and basically all of that is very good. I mean, you're going to do a terrific soup with that. Yeah. This is a lot of leak, and I know you like leak. You know, if you chop those and put them there, that's great. Look at the peas here. Yeah, you can do a couple of peas and see. Even though they are all yellow on top and so forth, you can look inside. Well, inside the peas are not rotten. You know, they are perfectly fine. You put them in soup. You put them in stew. And look even at that herb here. This is theoretically fresh herb, you know, like fresh oregano. It dries out, but remember, you buy dry herbs. So, you know, in between, it's perfectly fine. Especially if you buy it in the produce, you know, which is a third of the price. Look at those tomatoes. Well, that tomato is rotten. You can't do anything with it. This one is just soft, you know. You can put it in the soup. Not in a salad, but in a soup. And the mushroom here. See, people are afraid. You see those mushrooms? Look how soft they are, you know. Well, those mushrooms are older, but I tell you, they have more taste than the small white button mushroom. And they are much less expensive, you know. They basically don't cost anything. So, what do you do with those vegetables in your refrigerator? Usually, I throw them away. No, you can't. Well, look at that. Celery is good in soup. Just have to peel it, you know. All of that is usable. And you're going to save a lot of money. And if you save a lot of money, I'm going to save a lot of money, too. What did you bring here? Well, I saw you making the chicken fricassee, so I made one, too. And it's a little different than yours. I see that. I used eggplant and zucchini, and I only used the gizzards. Oh, you only used the gizzards. Yeah, that's good. That's a good idea. Let's move over there and see what... Oh, I see. So, you used those gizzards there. Uh-huh. Okay, you didn't bone out the chicken. No, I can't bone out a chicken. This is a lot easier to do. It's not that expensive. And, I mean, I saw you used the skin, you used the meat, you used everything. You didn't use the gizzards, so I figured... Oh, you used the gizzards. Okay. I used the gizzards. And I know that you have zucchini in there. You love zucchini and eggplant. And eggplant. That was leftover in your refrigerator, right? Yeah. Now, that's it. Well, I tell you, you know, the meat of the chicken, you better cover that, it's going to get cold. Okay. The meat of the chicken, we're going to finish it up. And this is, you know, the most elegant dish out of this. And I have those four pieces of meat, you know, the two breasts that I have there, and those two legs, which each one we cut into two pieces. Remember, I poached that in white wine, you know? Okay. And we're going to do a cream sauce with it, with tarragon on top. I think I'm going to remove this. And look at what I have on this side here. Why don't you give me the cream over there? This is going to be fattening. It is going to be fattening? You think so? That's a good point. I mean, a young lady like you always watch your diet, right? I try. Yes. And so, see what we have today? I have a chicken here, which I'm going to thicken with a little bit of potato starch, dilute it in water, you know, just to get a nice viscosity, you know, with it. You know, that thickens in contact. As soon as it touches, it thickens. Actually, I put too much in it. And when we want to put tarragon, I have chopped tarragon here, you know? Okay. Some chopped tarragon there. I can stop it. And, in fact, I can have a little more tarragon. What do you think is the most caloric dish? Remember, I did the chicken in cream sauce, the fricassee with the bone inside, and that soup, you know, that we did with the... What do you think is the most caloric? The chicken with the cream sauce. This is the one with the least amount of calories. It's almost half of the amount of what's in the soup. And the fricassee is in between. So, you see, you have to realize here I put four tablespoons of cream. That's one tablespoon per person. But I add no fat to stop the chicken win, you know? Oh, okay. No fat, nothing. Give me a little bit of water from there. And we are going to... See, this can go back in the sauce now, and it can stay a little while, and, you know, to develop more taste and so forth. It's a bit too thick, so I put some more water in this. Okay. So, we can serve this and arrange it nicely on a plate. I mean, what we have done today is not really a menu. I mean, you would not want to eat the chicken with the cream sauce with your fricassee and with the soup. No, I don't. But, you know, you can eat the soup and make a whole meal by itself with croutons and all that. It's very thick. You like soup. Yes. With a salad, soup, it makes a perfect meal. And what else would you do with that? With the... Well, either with the bone or with another type. What would you serve with your fricassee there? Probably just a salad. Just a salad? Yeah, because this way it's inexpensive. Why don't you cut some of this on top of your thing? Okay. You want to use the knife? No, I'm going to use scissors. Scissors is easier. Okay. So, a bit of decoration and taste. I mean, you see, if you go in a produce, sometimes it's going to cost you practically more to buy that bunch of chive than, you know, if it's not in season, than buying the rice and the bone that you put in there. I mean, that chicken, big dish, I mean, costs basically nothing, right? Mm-hmm. Now, of course, if you come home, you get that out of the garden. Yep. Okay. You remember your grandmother always make a chicken in cream sauce, you know? I'm sure you're going to tell me that mine is far to be as good as hers. I know that, but we'll put a piece of the back leg and half of a breast because we have both, you see? So, how many people would this be for, this one? Four, you know? A piece of white, a piece of the dark. And a little bit of sauce on top of this and more tarragon. Oh, it smells good. Smells good, huh? Okay, you want to put a bit of the herb on top, and that's it. Okay, well, now that we're done with the chicken, what are we going to do for dessert? Well, that's a good point, you know? You don't want to finish your meal without dessert, right? No. Well, what do you think if we do fruit? You want to know about fruit? Yes. I have a bunch of rotten fruit here. You know, often we buy fruit. My mother buys a lot of fruit. It stays on the table. Most of the time, it gets rotten. What do we do with it? Look at those, you know? You know, there is a lot of fruit there, different color. We can do a nice fruit salad with it. I'm going to do a sauce, and you can start taking some of those fruit to cut them into the sauce. This looks really bad. Yeah, that's bad. We'll have to cut that piece off, you know? And you can use it. But see, I put a little bit of orange marmalade here as a base, and you see that rotten lemon? Soft and all that. I still have enough juice in it. You need a bit of juice so that the fruit don't discolor it. Look at that. Oh, that's bad. See that? Look. Hold it. No, that's pretty bad, no. That you can't use. Yeah. That you can't use. Okay. Now, cut the thing directly on top of the salad, you know, when you cut it, so that we put it directly in there, okay? Now you want to cut the strawberry. Just cut out the bad part, you know? I mean, this one, see, that lower part is no good. The rest can go in it. I mean, look at that. This is no good. This is a red blood orange. This is rotten here, so I'll take that piece which is rotten. The rest, I'm going to peel it and put it inside. Why don't you cut the banana? See the banana, how black it is on the other side? Yeah. Yeah, it's black here. You see that? Yep. But it doesn't mean. In fact, you know, when it's black, very often it has a nice taste when you have those little black dots. I think that's when the banana is really ripe. Actually, that's when I like it the best, you know? So, see this, I cut just in pieces like this, and your banana also, just cut it on top of it. You want to do a mixture of fruit, and you want to use what you have left over. Okay? Okay. You do that at work? At school? Yeah. Well, I try to, but not always. It doesn't always work. See that apricot? It's all rotten here. Well, if I cut that part off, you know, it's perfectly fine underneath. So, that's what we do when you have a diversity. I mean, you have all kind of different. This also is soft on one side. I remove that piece, and the rest of it, it's not terrific, but that's pretty rotten, right? Yeah. I won't put it. Okay. You like fruit? Yes, of course I like fruit. You know, I know that at home, you rarely eat fruit unless I peel the fruit and give it to you, right? Why don't you cut this into pieces? Okay. Right, cut this into pieces, and that's it. We have a full bowl here for five, three or four cherries I can put in it. Why don't you mix it? You know, you want to stir it a little bit so that it looks nice. Okay, so that to put the juice, you know, the lemon juice comes on top so that it gives you a lot of nice taste in it. Okay, that's it. Now you can leave it there. You have nice color. You know, it's not because we're doing budget food that we have to eat standing up in the kitchen. You can have a nice setting. Let's go to the dining room. Okay. Okay, you go first. We're going to enjoy. We have a lot of food to eat today. Yes, a real lot of food. I think you're going to eat the whole thing? I'm not going to eat the whole thing. You can eat the whole thing if you want to. I can't. I mean, look at the menu that we have. A lot of food. It is not a menu, really. It is a mixture of different dish, but all done with one chicken, so it's quite inexpensive. First, we have, remember that soup with the split pea soup, and that's done with a bit of the crackling and with the leftover croutons outside. This is very nourishing. You can have a whole meal with that and a salad. Then we have our two fricassees that I'm going to taste, you know, a bit different. I mean, yours is probably easier to do than mine. And finally, we have the chicken with the tarragon sauce. And remember, you thought that was the highest calorie one. Actually, the lowest of all of it, and this is quite elegant. And finally, all our leftover fruit into a great salad there. Very, you know, a lot of fiber in it, beautiful color. I mean, I know that you're worried about time. You know, you don't have time to do things. I know you don't have money to do things. I know you want to lose weight, so what do you do? Well, usually, I end up cooking like this because it's easy. It's inexpensive, which is really important. And I can also leave it in the refrigerator for a couple days because I eat out two, three times a week. So if I don't eat it the next day, it's still good. But you cook occasionally. Yeah, I cook three, four times a week. Well, I'm proud of you. Thank you. And I hope you're proud of her, too. And I hope you're going to try that dish. I mean, the concept of it, certain of those dish, and in the whole meal together, if you taste a portion of it, it's about 925 calories, which is not that much. I hope you enjoy the show today. It was great to have you here, Titine. Thank you. Happy cooking.