- Hi, I'm Jacques Pepin.

A lot of people think that great food has to be expensive, but today I want to show you how easy it is to be thrifty in the kitchen, starting with using every possible part of a chicken.

I use the skin to help make a hearty split peas soup.

The bones add rich flavor to a rice fricassee with garlic, coriander and Spanish olive.

And the meat gets dressed up in a tarragon cream sauce that's surprisingly low in fat.

I'll even get some tips from a student, my daughter Claudine, on how to be thrifty in the kitchen.

That's all coming up on "Today's Gourmet."

(gentle music) (gentle music continues) 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 cook this way.

I remember when I was a child, from my aunt to my mother and all that, there were the great economy in the kitchen.

Economy not only in the dish itself, economy of motion or moving and so forth, and this is often what make great cook much more than other decorated plate and so forth.

And today we're going to emphasize budget.

I mean economy in the kitchen, the way the student asked to do it, to survive, you know?

And with the chicken here, we're going to do three different dish.

The first thing of course is to bone out the chicken.

And I'm going to remove some of the fat that we're 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 up and cut through the sinew, now I have my two leg.

Now I have the two wing.

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 this next to the bone here.

Grab the meat at the end here and pull on it again to get that breast of chicken, you know?

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 breast.

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 the 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 here, 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 have to be cut in smaller piece 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 are 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 happened 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 bone here goes into that large sauce pan 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 choices spot right here that we are going to do a chicken with cream sauce and fricassee with it.

So the first thing that I will 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 it 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 this 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 dish together, but those emphasize economy in the kitchen.

And that's what I want to show you today.

So that goes with it.

(chicken crackling) We put it on, I put a dash of salt in this, it has to come to a strong boil and it boiled 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.

We'll put that here.

Meanwhile, I wanna 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 saute the onion.

I have the soup here.

I have a large onion, I have some garlic, I have some herb, herbs de Provence, a mixture of herb, and split peas, which have been washed.

Those split pea, of course, are very high in soluble fiber and it's quite good.

So let's first saute the onion.

You know, if you have a large sauce pan, if you have a large sauce pan to do your soup, a large soup pan, you can render your fat directly.

I mean the skin, you can render it directly into your soup pan.

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 saute this a little bit, garlic to it.

Separate the head of garlic by hitting it, you heat it on the side.

Couple of cloves here that I have in there.

And that's going to go into our soup.

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 herbs de Provence there on top of the seasoning, can put my salt even now, everything here.

And basically we have all of our ingredient here for the soup.

And this, put that into a large stock pot, the split peas, cold water on top of it.

Bring that to a boil.

You wanna bring that to a boil and you want to simmer it gently, you know.

So this is out of the way.

Now we can move on to the third dish, which is the fricassee, you know.

And the fricassee here, we are doing it with a 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 so important, if the crystallization of the juice and our 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.

Sauteing 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.

Strong.

Now, make that well, then I put the rice in it and I have olives here.

All chopped olive, you know.

Now if you feel that olive are too expensive, then omit them.

And I have muscat resin.

Those are dry large resin.

Again, you can replace with another type of resin or fig or whatever you want.

Doesn't have to be this.

We have some cilantro, which is that spicy type of Chinese parsley.

So called sometime 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 make that together.

And finally, the water.

Remember you put approximately off of the amount of water, I mean double the amount of water than rice.

You have a cup of rice, two cup 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 50 minutes.

And talking about this, I think that the leg of chicken have been cooking for a while so I'll put the breast to finish with them in that liquid here.

Another eight, 10 minute.

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 add some leftover bread.

You slice your leftover bread and crouton.

That's going to go well with your soup here.

So here is our soup, which is quite thick, you know.

And our recipe are for four, and believe me, this is plenty for four of that thick, heavy split soup with its crouton.

And this is terrific that can make a whole meal in itself.

(gentle lively music) 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 wanna waste it 'cause 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 thing like this because I buy it for a fraction of the price.

So 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, you know?

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 look 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 shove those and put them there, that's great.

Look at the peas here.

Here you can do a couple of peas and see, even though they're all yellow on top and so forth, you can look the inside.

Well the inside the peas are not rotten.

You know, they're perfectly fine.

You put them in soup, you put them in stew.

And look, even at that herb here, this is theoretically fresh herbs, you know, like fresh oregano- - Yeah, they're all bad.

- It dries out.

But remember, you buy dry herbs, so you know, in between its perfectly fine.

Especially if you buy it in the produce, you know, which is a third of the price.

Look at those tomato.

Well that tomato is rotten.

You can't do anything with it.

This one is just soft, you know, you can put it in a soup, not in a salad, but in a soup.

- Yeah.

- And the mushroom here.

See?

people already are afraid.

You see those mushroom are?

Look how soft they are, you know?

Well those mushroom 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 vegetable in your refrigerator?

- Usually, I throw them away.

(laughs) - No, you can't eat in.

Well, look at that.

This celery is good in soup.

Just have to peel it, you know?

- Yeah.

- All of that is usable and you're gonna save a lot of money.

And if you save a lot of money, I'm gonna 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 use the gizzards.

- Oh, you only use the... Yeah, that's good.

That's a good idea.

- So.

- Well, let's move over there and see what... Oh, I see.

So you use those gizzard 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 use the skin, you used the meat, you used everything, you didn't use the gizzards.

So I figured, - Oh, you use the gizzard.

Okay.

- I used the gizzards.

- And I know that you have zucchini there.

You love zucchini and eggplant - And eggplant.

- And that was left over 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 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 piece of meat, you know the two breasts that I have there, and those two leg, which each one we cut into two piece.

Remember, I poached that in white wine, you know?

- And we are 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 gonna 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.

So see what we have today.

I have a chicken here, which I'm going to thicken with a little bit of potato starch diluted in water, you know, just to get a nice viscosity, you know, with it.

You know that thicken in contact, that's enough.

They touch, it thicken.

Actually, I put too munch in it.

And when we wanna 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 if the most caloric of the 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?

- Well, the chicken with the cream sauce.

- This isú the one where 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 tablespoon of cream.

That's one tablespoon per person.

But I had no fat to stop the chicken wing, you know.

- Oh okay.

- No fat, nothing.

Give me a little bit of water from there.

- Okay.

- 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 the plate.

I mean what we have done today is not really a menu.

I mean, you would not want to eat the chicken- - No.

- With a 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 crouton and all that.

It's very thick.

You like soup?

- Yes.

- With a salad.

- Yeah.

That would be good.

- 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?

You you want to use the knife or?

- No, I'm use scissors.

- Scissors is easier.

Okay, so a bit of decoration and taste.

I mean you see, if you go in a produce, sometime it's going to cost you practically more to buy that bunch of chives 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, cost basically nothing, right?

- 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 it's 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.

- For 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.

- It smells good, huh?

Okay, you want to put a bit of those there on top and that's it.

- Okay, well now that we're done with the chicken, what are we gonna do for dessert?

- Well that's a good point.

You know you don't want to finish your meal without the dessert, right?

- No.

- Well what do you think if we do fruit?

You wanna go about fruit?

- Yes.

- I have a bunch of rotten fruit here.

You know, often we buy fruit.

Your mother buy a lot of fruit, it stays on the table.

Most have the time it get 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 we can use it.

But see I put a little bit of a orange marmalade here at the 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?

- Yeah, hold it.

No, that's pretty bad.

No, that you can't use.

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't 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 like just in pieces like this and your banana also just get it on top of it.

You wanna do a mixture of fruit and you want to use what you've left over.

Okay?

- Okay.

- You do that at work?

I mean at school.

Yeah.

- At school?

Well I try to but not always.

Doesn't always work.

- See that apricot?

So rotten here.

Well if I cut that part off, you know, it's perfectly fine underneath.

So that's what we do.

And 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, well that's pretty rotten, right?

- Yeah.

- I won't put it.

Okay.

You like fruit?

- Yes, of course I like fruit.

- But 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.

I have 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 give 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, huh?

- Oh, okay.

- We can have a nice setting.

Let's go to the dining room, you know?

- Okay.

- Okay, so you go first.

We're gonna enjoy, we have a lot of food to eat today.

- Yes.

A really lot of food.

- Think we gonna eat the whole thing?

- I'm not gonna 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 a split peas soup and that's done with a bit of the crackling and with the leftover crouton outside, this is very nourishing.

You can have a whole meal with that and a salad.

Then we have our two fricassee that I'm going to taste, you know, a bit different.

I mean your 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.

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 'cause 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.

I cook 3, 4 times a week.

- But 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 or I mean the concept of it, certain of those dish, and in the whole meal together, if you test a portion of each at about 925 calories, which is not that much.

I hope you enjoy the show today.

It was great to have you here, Claudine.

- Thank you.

- Happy cooking.