MARCIA GAGLIARDI: So
it is no small honor
to be here today in conversation
with Jacques Pepin-- or as I
like to say, the man,
the myth, the legend.
Many of us have felt like we've
grown up on his cooking shows
on public television,
and I hope we all
have at least a couple of his
25 books on our kitchen shelves.
I see quite a few in here today.
Jacques has been in the
kitchen for more than 60 years,
beginning with his formal
apprenticeship at 13 years
old-- they start
them young in France.
And he left his home
for Paris, cooking
in some of the most
revered establishments,
like [? Norise ?]
and Plaza Athenee,
and eventually cooking for
French president Charles
de Gaulle.
He made his way to New York,
and ended up at Howard Johnson's
as the director of research.
What follows is
his career in food
that we all benefit from-- as
a chef on public television,
an instructor, an author,
a columnist, and an artist.
And let's not forget his
many awards, including
France's ultimate
civilian recognition,
the Legion of Honor.
Right now, we're lucky
to have Jacques with us
in the Bay Area,
as he's currently
shooting "Jacques Pepin:
Heart and Soul," with PBS.
The 26-episode series is set
to broadcast on PBS stations
in fall of 2015, and
will show Jacques
at home, tending his
garden, or in the studio,
cooking everything
from veal chops
dijonnaise to fast fougasse,
and showing you the techniques
that he's known for.
Expect many stories
from his past, including
tales of Julia Child, of course.
And some guest chefs will
be making some appearances
as well.
And there will also be a
companion cookbook, coming out
in October 2015-- "Jacques
Pepin: Heart and Soul
in the Kitchen," with
over 200 recipes,
including the secret to
his great burger recipe.
[LAUGHTER]
MARCIA GAGLIARDI:
So before we dive
in to what you're doing
now, I have a few questions
about your earlier years.
So let's take a little
trip down memory lane.
We'll go in the
way-back machine.
When you came to
the US, it was 1959?
JACQUES PEPIN: Yeah.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: Were
the cooking techniques
different to those in France?
What did you see here?
JACQUES PEPIN: Well, it was
another world altogether.
I mean, to tell you
the truth, when I first
came here, it was the middle
of the September, I believe,
the day after I started at
the Pavillon in New York.
And the Pavillon was the
quintessential French
restaurant, considered the
greatest French restaurant
in America.
So relatively the
techniques were not
much different than
what I did in France.
Product were different.
We lived-- my friend Jean-Claude
and I-- joined me pretty soon.
We had an apartment on
50th and First Avenue.
And on First
Avenue, that's where
I met my first supermarket.
I'd never been in a
supermarket before.
And it was kind of
the beginning here.
So a lot of package,
a lot of package,
a lot of package-- but
no mushroom, no parsley.
But the meat was great.
I mean, the beef,
lamb-- inexpensive.
Lobster, too.
But the products were different.
I mean, certainly, when you cook
as a chef, you cook by taste.
You don't cook by recipe.
I mean, the recipe is
purely a typewritten page
that doesn't really mean much.
So you go behind this.
And doing a lobster souffle
in Paris at the Plaza Athenee
and doing it in
New York, in order
to achieve the same
taste, ingredients
have to be different.
You keep testing.
I mean, the tarragon or the type
of thing have much less taste,
so you put more.
Ultimately, fine-- you reach
the taste that you want.
But what was your question?
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: So it
was about the techniques
that you found here.
JACQUES PEPIN: Oh, techniques.
Right, right.
No, otherwise, the
technique with this,
of course when I left
Howard Johnson-- when
I left the Pavillon and
went to Howard Johnson, that
was a different world, a world
that I knew nothing about.
Mass production, the
chemistry of food--
I'd never heard word like
coliform or bacteria.
So anyway, I learn about
mass marketing and so forth.
So that was very useful
for me later on in life,
when I opened restaurant
and did other things.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: Very
different experience.
And when you were the
personal chef for Charles De
Gaulle, what was one
of his favorite dishes?
JACQUES PEPIN: Well, someone
introduced me a few weeks ago
and said, that man was chef
to three French presidents.
The three of them are dead.
[LAUGHTER]
It's true, they are dead.
Well, when you deal with
a president, of course--
I dealt with Madame De Gaulle
for the menu of the week.
Maybe secretary of
state, whatever.
The family and certainly
the Sunday meal
all were very important.
They were very devout Catholic.
And after church
on Sunday, there
would be the whole family--
10, 12 people, children,
grandchildren, and so forth.
And for that it was the
menu that she wanted,
cooked the way she wanted.
She wanted a leg of
lamb-- not too rare, no
good for the blood of
the president, whatever.
It was the way she wanted.
And I have to add,
even, that every week,
I did my accounting-- whatever
we spent during the week--
to pay the supplier
and so forth.
And that Sunday meal had to
come from their own pocket.
They wanted to pay
for it themselves,
even though they were
not very wealthy.
So it was a question of,
I think, ethical or moral.
That was the president.
When you deal with a
state dinner-- you know,
I served people like Eisenhower
at the time, Macmillan, Nehru,
Tito.
Those were head of
state at the time.
Then you deal with
the protocol--
that is, someone
comes to you and say,
OK-- like for
President Eisenhower--
they say, OK, the
president already, they
have two or three meal together,
either at the American embassy,
whatever.
They already served
that fish, this, that.
You don't want to
duplicate those things.
Or it's show.
Lunch has to be 45 minutes,
or it's a complicated dinner--
it has to be 2 and 1/2 hours.
You know, different
courses and so forth.
And in addition to this,
there is other requirements.
For example, you're not going
to serve a roast of pork
to the King of Monaco.
So they tell you--
this, this, this.
And within that
frame lines, then you
show the menu, duplicate too.
So at that point, it's
much less the taste
of the president than the--
MARCIA GAGLIARDI:
What the event is.
JACQUES PEPIN: The
affair itself, yeah.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: So how did
you make the segue from chef
for the president of
France to TV star,
and how did you make your
way to public television?
Could you share
that story with us?
JACQUES PEPIN: I
guess it was luck.
I don't know.
When I came to America, still,
50 years ago, the cook-- chef--
was really at the bottom
of the social scale.
And any good mother would
have wanted her child
to marry the lawyer or doctor,
but certainly not a cook.
Now we are genius.
I don't know what
happened exactly.
[LAUGHTER]
So things changed a great deal.
I have to say that
after nouvelle cuisine
in the '70s, late
'60s, maybe late '60s,
started to shine-- women
liberation, organic food,
health food store.
It was a social charge, which
maybe react against the TV
dinner of the '50s and so forth.
So things started to change.
Prior to that time, I didn't
know any white American chefs.
The only chefs that
I knew cooked with me
were the kids I worked with
at Howard Johnson, which
were very often
African American.
And all the chefs that I knew
in New York in big restaurants
were German, Swiss,
Italian, French.
There was no kid who'd
get into that business.
And then the thing
exploded and changed.
There are extraordinary
chefs in this country now.
So it was very, very different.
And for me, I worked
at Howard Johnson.
I learned a great deal
in terms of production.
That's why I could open the
World Trade Center after,
with [INAUDIBLE].
Then I was a consultant for the
Russian Tea Room in New York.
I opened a restaurant
on Fifth Avenue
called La Potagerie in 1970.
Again, mass
production-- I could not
have done that if I hadn't had
the training at Howard Johnson.
And I don't know,
I started writing.
I was friends
with-- three months,
six months maybe
after I was here,
I met Craig Claiborne, who
started at the New York Times.
He came to the Pavillon-- yeah,
it was here at the Pavillon.
So maybe three, four
months after I was here.
And I became friends with Craig.
He introduced me
to Helen McCully.
She was a foodie, [INAUDIBLE],
"House Beautiful."
And she was never married,
never had any kids,
so she kind of became
my surrogate mother.
Don't wear those stupid
socks you wear in France.
[LAUGHTER]
Don't do this, don't do that.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: She gave
you American training.
JACQUES PEPIN: And through
Helen-- Helen told me one day,
oh, I have that manuscript
I just received here
from someone who
wrote that cookbook.
You want to take a look at it?
I said, that's pretty good.
She said, well, the woman,
she lives in California.
She's coming next week.
You want to cook for her?
I said, sure.
And she says, she's a very tall
woman with a terrible voice.
Of course, that was Julia.
[LAUGHTER]
So that's how I met Julia.
And Helen spoke with James
Beard like twice a day,
about anything going
on in the food world.
My point is that less than
six months after I was here,
I knew kind of the
trinity of cooking, which
was Craig Claiborne,
James Beard, Julia Child.
So you can see that the
food world was very, very
small at the time.
It was totally different.
So I started writing
because Helen
was writing for "House
Beautiful," and so forth.
And I started doing a column.
She pushed me into
writing a little more,
and that led one
thing to another.
And I don't even know how
I came on to do television.
But doing one show
or another, I was
asked to go one
place or another.
Actually, I did a series
in 1982, I believe,
in Jacksonville, Florida,
called "Everyday Cooking."
And then after that,
even WGBH in New York,
WGBH in Boston, WADT in
New York-- they were big--
asked me, will you be
interested in doing it?
I said, great, I'd love to.
But it never went anywhere.
They never raised the money.
And then I came here.
It was '88, maybe '87.
And I gave classes all
the '70s and the '80s
after I did-- I was
traveling like 30,
40 weeks out of the year, giving
classes all over the country.
It was the time when
cooking school opened,
cookware shop, all
that type of thing
which didn't exist before.
So I went to give classes.
They say, can you
come next year?
We'll put you on the calendar.
So I was kind of booked ahead.
So I end up giving
class in Foster City
here, at Martin Yan, who just
opened a cooking school there.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: Yep.
JACQUES PEPIN: So he asked me,
I have to do a show on KQED.
Do you want to come with me?
And I said, sure, I'd love to.
So I came there, did
that show with him, too.
And Marjorie Poore, who was the
executive producer at the time,
told me-- maybe a week
later, called to say,
would you be interested
in doing a series with us?
MARCIA GAGLIARDI:
You were a natural.
JACQUES PEPIN: I said,
sure, I'd love to.
I didn't really expect it to
fly, but they raised the money.
I did it and I've been
there over 25 years.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: Incredible.
So tell us a little
bit about a day
in the life of filming
right now at KQED.
I understand you are
on quite a schedule.
JACQUES PEPIN: Yes.
We do two or three shows a day.
Yesterday we did three.
Day before, two.
Day before, three.
So yes, it's pretty intense.
The point is that it's
very well organized.
Fantastic team-- Tina Salter,
the producer, Paul Swensen,
the director.
We have a big, big team.
I don't go in the control
room so I don't really
know what's going on there.
So I can't really
see what they see
or what it looks like because
from my point of view--
but to a certain extent,
nothing is script.
I'm not an actor.
If I had to read, I'd be
totally messed up in my cooking.
So for me, I have
a recipe to do.
I know what I'm going to do.
More or less, I
tell the cameraman,
OK, I'm going to start with
that and I'll continue there.
Then while this is cooking,
maybe I'll do this, too.
And it works more
or less this way.
And so there is nothing
script-- at least
we have the recipe here.
Maybe I don't
follow them exactly,
but that gives an idea to
the back kitchen and all
that, what we're going to do.
When I did the series with
Julia, we had no recipes,
so that was quite different.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: Wow.
That was very ad hoc.
And do you plan the themes?
You work together--
JACQUES PEPIN: Yes.
Yes.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: How does
that all work together?
JACQUES PEPIN: It can't
really be anyone else but me
who do the recipes.
I've been working on that
book for a couple of years,
and then the book of
about 200-some recipes.
So we choose 26 show, about
four recipes-- three, four,
five recipes-- per show, so
it's about 140 recipes, maybe,
that we extrapolated from those.
We tried to get them into theme.
So I did actually two shows
with Jean Claude-- one
cooking in the country with him.
The stuff that he likes--
like, he killed deer every year
with his bow and
arrow, so we did deer.
We did stuff like this.
And another one actually,
cooking for the president.
We were in France, so it was
a more elaborate type of meal.
Then my daughter and
granddaughter were here.
They just went back last
week, to Rhode Island.
And I did six shows with
Shorey, my granddaughter,
who is 10 years old,
and my daughter.
So that was fun.
Different theme.
We did a show on the economy.
I want to show people to
cook for very little money.
We did even a show on offal,
you know, the variety meat,
because now the young
chefs are into pig's feet--
MARCIA GAGLIARDI:
Tongue and heart.
JACQUES PEPIN: --brain and
kidney, on and so forth,
which people did not
a number of years ago.
We did a couple of shows on the
Mexican influence, if you want,
because I have an apartment
in Playa del Carmen.
We go during the winter.
So cooking there,
going to the market.
So you know, it
was a little bit--
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: Varied.
JACQUES PEPIN:
Themed, yes, right.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: And I would
love to talk a little bit more
about Mexico.
So how long have you
been going there?
JACQUES PEPIN: Well,
with that apartment,
it's about 12 years old.
We went there a couple of years
prior to this, and we liked it.
And we decided to escape
the winter of Connecticut.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: Yeah,
because you're in Connecticut.
Yeah, that's not an easy time.
JACQUES PEPIN: So usually
my wife and Claude's wife
and I-- the four of us, we go.
And we have some
friends coming, too.
So yeah, we have great fun.
We go to the [INAUDIBLE],
struggle with our Spanish.
You go buy fish directly
from the fishmonger,
or rather, the fishermen.
We go there and it's fun.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: And so are you
really excited about exploring
more about Mexican cuisine
or some of the regions?
Has that, over the years, grown?
JACQUES PEPIN: Yes, well I've
worked with Rick Bayless,
with the great
specialist of that.
Actually, two weeks ago--
two or three weeks ago,
right-- we did, when I
first came, at Farallon
in San Francisco, one of the
greatest restaurants there.
The chef, Mark Franz,
is really fantastic.
And anyway, they were hosting
us for a special for PBS,
which will come out next
December-- not this one,
the one after.
And a special for the pledge of
PBS, so it's an hour or an hour
and a half special which will
be used all over the country.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: It's kind of
a big occasion, that episode,
I understand.
JACQUES PEPIN: Right.
It was Lydia Bastianich,
Rick Bayless--
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: It's
for his 80th birthday, so.
JACQUES PEPIN:
Yeah, that will be
to celebrate my 80th
birthday next year.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: You made it.
JACQUES PEPIN:
Nothing to celebrate.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: What are
some of the dishes they're
cooking for you in the show?
Can you give us a little--
JACQUES PEPIN: Well, Lydia
cooked a roast of pork stuffed
with prunes and some
spaetzle and all that.
Ming Tsai, more in
the Chinese style.
A red chicken-- that is a
chicken poached into a broth
with a great deal of hot
pepper and different type
of hot sauce.
And actually, Rick Bayless
did three different types
of ceviche.
Because we cooked together
in my apartment in Playa,
he came to tape a series
on the Yucatan peninsula,
and we cooked a couple
of shows together.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: And when
you're in San Francisco,
are you hitting any taquerias?
Have you had any Mexican
food since you've been here?
JACQUES PEPIN: Any Mexican food?
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: I don't think
you find a lot in Connecticut.
JACQUES PEPIN: Yes, we
had tacos the other day,
I think from a truck.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: The best.
JACQUES PEPIN: But
no, otherwise, we
work usually until
7 o'clock at night.
And we've done a
fair amount of dinner
which were already
staged or planned
for one reason or another.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: And while
you've been in San Francisco,
I'm sure everybody
is thrilled to have
you come to their restaurant.
I know you've been
on the town a bit.
Are there some
places you've really
enjoyed during your visit?
JACQUES PEPIN:
Well, I went to see
Roland Passot a couple of
times at La Folie and all that.
He's from my hometown in France.
And certainly, we went to
a good Yunnan restaurant.
And at Farallon, we ate
there twice, otherwise.
We had a fantastic meal.
Otherwise, we ate at Le
Colonial, the two of us
the other night.
And we ate in a Korean
restaurant around the corner
also.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: Nice.
A little international.
So let's hear some fun
stories about being
back in the studio for you.
How's that been?
Good times with the crew?
JACQUES PEPIN: It's fun.
I mean, it's a lot of pressure.
But as I said, we don't really
have anything structured,
or no script or
anything like that.
So I know that I'm going
to talk about chicken
or about broccoli,
but I don't really
know what I'm going
to say until we start
and I'm trying to explain.
Still, when I cook, I still try
to show the process of cooking.
I still try to
explain the technique.
I was told-- I went to
a place a few weeks ago
and there was a
food historian who
said that there are 407 cookery
shows on television now.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: Amazing.
JACQUES PEPIN: I don't
know whether it's accurate,
but if it's not-- maybe 350.
In any case, a great
deal of those are reality
shows, fighting--
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: Competitions.
JACQUES PEPIN: And it's fine.
It's different.
But this is not what I do.
I still try to
teach a little bit.
And I'm sure a lot of
people look at it, say,
that guy is really boring, too.
Fine.
Doesn't really matter.
You cannot please everybody.
When I go to the Food and
Wine Festival in Aspen--
and I will be there
in June-- and that
will be number 32
for me, for 32 years.
I think the festival
is 33 or 34.
You go there, everyone is
there, from Bobby Flay,
to Mario Batali, to Thomas
Keller, to Lydia Bastianich,
me.
So people will
come and tell me, I
look at all the
show on television.
You're the best.
And why do they tell me that?
Because the people
who don't like
me don't come and talk to me.
[LAUGHTER]
Only the people who like
me come and talk to me.
They go to Bobby Flay and
say, I look at all the show.
You are the greatest,
and so forth.
And that's fine.
That's the way it should be.
Everyone can relate to someone
and it works well on that.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: Yeah.
And is there anyone
you've ever wanted
to film with that either you
asked and they couldn't or is
there someone you would love
as a guest on your show?
JACQUES PEPIN: Yes.
I mean, there is
many, many people
that I like to cook with.
But ultimately, my friend
Jean-Claude, my daughter,
granddaughter, my wife--
if I asked her to film,
I would get a divorce
after 48 years of marriage.
She hates to go
on the television.
So we did a couple
of shows together,
but she wasn't crazy about it.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: Oh no?
JACQUES PEPIN:
Usually, you go back
to doing it with your
friend, your family,
and that's where
you enjoy the most.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: And if you and
Julia could cook one more meal
together on TV, what would
you love to make with her?
JACQUES PEPIN: Actually,
we did two shows last week
in memory of Julia,
inspired by her.
I don't know, you know.
She was a pretty good
[INAUDIBLE] woman.
We also shared a great
many bottle of wine.
The point is that if I
had to have a last meal,
we would have things that
we like to eat from hot dog
to caviar, from foie
gras to roast chicken.
And it will be a very,
very, very, very long meal.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: Yes.
JACQUES PEPIN: The last one.
It would have to be.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: Why
just have one meal?
JACQUES PEPIN: If I know
that I'm dying tomorrow,
going to the
guillotine or whatever,
probably won't
have much appetite.
So my last meal
would be [INAUDIBLE].
[LAUGHTER]
MARCIA GAGLIARDI:
So I understand
that you're quite the forager.
And I'd love to hear
what you forage,
and who taught you which
mushrooms you can eat.
JACQUES PEPIN: Well, we
pick up about, I would say,
20 different type of mushroom.
There is over 4,000 type
of mushroom in the world.
And if you don't know it,
especially in the Amanita
family, there is a lot
of deadly mushroom.
So you have to be careful.
For me, I have my wife
taste it, so it's fine.
[LAUGHTER]
Just kidding.
Yeah, we get from wild leek to,
I don't know, a lot of stuff.
We go fishing.
And I did, when Claudine,
my daughter, was a kid.
And now I do it with
my granddaughter.
We go net fishing and
get those tiny white bait
at the end of the summer
that usually the fishermen
use for bait.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: Fry them up.
JACQUES PEPIN: And you press on
the belly to extract the center
and wash them,
roll them in flour,
deep fry them like French fries.
And in France, if you go
there, in England and all that,
they're expensive.
But are very good.
We do a lot of things like
that, go for mussels, clams.
And, of course, in
the wood, we get even
at Hammonasset Beach,
where I go in Connecticut,
like last summer I picked
up a lot of the wild
rose coming out in summer.
They are not
sprayed or anything.
They are incredibly fragrant.
So I take petal to crystallize
with sugar, and all that to-do.
Then we take the bulb at
the end of this summer to do
rose hip jelly.
And then there is plum beach.
They're a tiny wild plum.
So I pick them up to put them
in alcohol with either a grain
alcohol or vodka
and a bit of honey.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: Perfect.
JACQUES PEPIN: So
things like that.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: You can
raise a glass to Julia.
And you're also a
gardener as well.
JACQUES PEPIN: Well,
not as good as Claude.
I mean, he's got leek that big.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: That's crazy.
JACQUES PEPIN: My leek
are about that big.
Yeah, we do always some
salad and of course I
have a lot of different
type of herbs.
In the summer, some tomato
and a few eggplant, zucchini.
It's not a big garden.
You know, what happens is that
when your tomato are ready,
well, they're already
in the farms around,
and I can get a
bushel for like $4.
But no, it's great to get
it just out of the garden.
There is nothing
better than that.
When I was a young chef, I see
food like many young chefs.
You keep adding to the plate.
You put one herb and
more, and this and that,
and this and that.
And now that I'm old, I take
away, take away from the plate,
to be left with one tomato.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI:
Perfect tomato.
JACQUES PEPIN: Right out
of the garden, lukewarm.
Perfect olive oil, coarse salt.
That's it.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: Alice
Waters would approve.
So I understand that
you are from Lyon.
JACQUES PEPIN: Yes, actually,
I was born in Bourg-en-Bresse.
Next to Lyon, yes.
But my mother had a
restaurant in Lyon.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: One of the
most amazing culinary places
in the world.
JACQUES PEPIN: I don't know.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: Well.
JACQUES PEPIN: I don't say that.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: So what are
some of your favorite recipes
and dishes from that
area and from home?
Do you make anything?
JACQUES PEPIN: Well, you know,
memories-- food memories--
are very, very powerful
and very strong.
I think it was a Chinese
philosopher, name
of Lin Yutang, I believe,
who said, what is patriotism?
Patriotism is the taste of
the dishes you had as a kid.
And there is a great
deal of truth there.
I mean, I'm paraphrasing,
maybe not exactly.
But it's true.
Those dishes that
you had as a kid
will stay with you
the rest of your life.
And those tastes will
haunt you, and there
will be nothing
better than that.
I remember, my wife was
born in New York City.
And her little brother
was a farmer in New York.
And I remember him coming
one time at the house.
I had fresh asparagus.
I did.
He doesn't like fresh asparagus.
He liked canned asparagus,
and he'd drink the juice.
It's horrible, but that's
what he had as a kid.
So for him, he
remembered that taste.
And I will, too.
So I did a couple of show there,
in food memory of my mother,
and so forth, so
chicken in cream
sauce my mother used to do.
The canard, the pike
dumpling that she would do.
A gratin of cauliflower stew.
The simple soup with
vermicelli and leek in it.
All of those dishes.
I did the same thing with
Claudine, my daughter.
She had the dish in her head.
And for her, this is
what the great food is,
and we are all like this.
So when you look
at different people
and different ethnic
groups, different cuisines,
you have to understand
that even a cuisine--
I did a fair amount of time
in West Africa, for example.
Then you have a thieboudienne
or different type of broken rice
and you say it's pretty-- not
very good, pretty dry, too.
But if you had that
as a child, this
is a very essential
dish for you.
And those memories
are there to stay.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: Forever.
And on that note, what are
some of your favorite smells
in the kitchen?
JACQUES PEPIN: My
favorite smells?
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: Smells
in the kitchen, yes.
JACQUES PEPIN: Red wine.
[LAUGHTER]
MARCIA GAGLIARDI:
Beef bourguignon?
JACQUES PEPIN: No.
Leek and potato
soup, when it cooked,
it's very, very special.
A chicken, when it's really
roasting in the oven.
As a chef, you use your
senses-- not only your eyes,
even your ear can go in front
of the oven and tell you
the chicken is cooked.
Just hearing it.
At some point, you know, the
fat of the chicken come out
and it start frying
a little bit,
and there's another
sound that it's roasting.
So, by habit, you use all
of those kind of senses.
Yes, so those smells tell you
the quality of the chicken
or a squab or a duck.
When it comes from a farm,
really organic and good,
it smells quite different than
the square thing with plastic
on top that is called a
chicken in the supermarket.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: In a body bag.
JACQUES PEPIN: It
doesn't have any feet,
it doesn't have any head
or anything like this.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI:
And so what do you
think are five dishes
that every good home
cook should know how to do well?
JACQUES PEPIN: Well, you should
know how to cook an egg well.
I mean, eggs-- for me, I
couldn't live with eggs.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: Cheers.
JACQUES PEPIN: And
when we were kids,
we get our protein much more
from eggs than with meat,
because it was less expensive.
So a gratin of eggs-- you
know, I did some on the show,
in fact-- gratin of egg
with Swiss chard underneath,
cheese on the top.
The hard-cooked eggs,
different type of omelette
and all that are very important.
So eggs, yes, certainly.
Potato.
I love potatoes.
So potato and chicken.
I roast potato.
I roast chicken.
You know, for me, it's
still an essential dish.
For dessert, maybe
an apple tart.
I go back to my mother
and just the dough,
the apple, sugar,
and butter on top.
That's it.
You know, things like that.
A good salad, a good
vinaigrette is very important.
A salad which is
washed properly,
which is drained properly, which
is with the proper percentage
of vinegar to oil, dash of
mustard, bit of garlic in it.
A salad is really a thing
that you go back to.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI:
Again and again.
And what are some dishes
that your friends and family
ask for you to make
for them at home?
A couple of favorites?
JACQUES PEPIN: Well
again, it's so different.
Claudine will come
home and she'll
want me to do a cheese fondue or
something like that, or a soup,
because that's what
she'd like me to do.
My granddaughter will ask
me for something else.
She'll ask me not for
eggs, too, but usually
for maybe chocolate
truffle or usually dessert.
My wife loves offal.
So my wife asks me to saute
some kidney or calf's liver
or whatever.
And then when I am with
Jean-Claude, it's different.
We'll do also, very often,
a variety of meat or things
like that.
But otherwise, big
roasts and so forth.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: Perfect.
So let's talk a little
bit about wine-- one
of my favorite topics.
I almost brought us
some champagne earlier.
I was like, that would
be-- is 11:00 AM too early?
No?
[LAUGHTER]
JACQUES PEPIN: Are you kidding?
You know what time
it is in France?
[LAUGHTER]
JACQUES PEPIN: 5 o'clock.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI:
My watch is always
set to champagne
o'clock, always.
I would love to hear some of
your favorite wines to drink,
maybe just some of your
everyday drinking wines,
maybe a few special
occasion wines.
What's your palate with wine?
JACQUES PEPIN: We are lucky.
In New York, Connecticut, we
get wine at a really good price.
And I rarely pay more than
$12, $15 for a bottle of wine.
And I can [INAUDIBLE]
some great wine.
For me, I go back to--
I'm from Beaujolais,
so I'm going back to that type
of wine, maybe Cotes du Rhone.
I like a wine which-- I
don't like the wine too oaky.
In the whites, certainly,
I like something crisp.
Relatively low in the
12, 12.5% alcohol.
I like a great
wine occasionally.
A great [INAUDIBLE] wine
from California, as well as
a great French
Bordeaux or whatever.
But unfortunately--
or fortunately, I
guess-- because of
who I am, I'm invited
and people are going
to give me five
of those great wine in a row.
After the second one, I want
a Beaujolais or something
like this.
One great one to remember.
If I have too many, I don't
remember, and likewise
with the food.
I'm not crazy about menu
degustastions, where
you have nine different
dish, big like this.
Each time you have that much
wine that you have to analyze,
too.
It's like going to work.
[LAUGHTER]
I want to go out, have a taco
and a beer somewhere and relax.
But I would love a glass
of champagne, of course.
And then after, a white wine.
And then, a red wine.
And that's about it in a meal.
Not nine in a row.
I think it's too much.
And my tastes are pretty
simple, not complicated.
I'm not difficult to please.
I'm satisfied with the best.
[LAUGHTER]
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: One
of my favorite quotes.
JACQUES PEPIN: Oscar Wilde,
who said that, right?
Wasn't it?
I think.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: Yes.
JACQUES PEPIN: Yes.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: So we also
had some Google Moderator
questions.
Some people online wanted
to ask you some questions.
So I have one here that says,
"I love cooking and have
had great success with a
variety of recipes, including
complex ones.
However, I don't have
confidence not using a recipe.
How would you suggest
venturing out without a recipe,
how to develop a sense
of seasoning to taste?"
JACQUES PEPIN: First thing
you do in the kitchen,
you have a glass of wine.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: Cheers.
Yes.
Good answer.
JACQUES PEPIN: Second thing you
do is another glass of wine.
After, the recipe, it
works out very easily.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI:
Everything tastes great.
JACQUES PEPIN: Don't
worry too much.
This is not brain surgery.
And it's not because
you forget, I
don't know, to put in
the vanilla in your cake
or something like that.
You're not going to the
guillotine or anything
like this.
Fine.
And if the chicken
is a bit burned,
you have a third glass of wine.
By then, you don't really care.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: Then
you have take out.
No.
I remember, I was
making Christmas cookies
and the dough was sticking
and it was just a nightmare.
And I called my dad and he said,
honey, first things first--
did you pour yourself
some bourbon?
He's like, why don't you
drink that and call me
in five minutes?
You're too upset.
JACQUES PEPIN: It's true.
People say, how do I start?
I said, do you have
a friend who cooks?
I mean, everyone has
a friend who cooks.
Say, OK.
Next time you're invited
to her house or his house,
you say, can I
come an hour ahead?
I want to cook with you.
I'll bring a bottle of wine.
And then you cook.
You do something simple.
And boost your
confidence a little bit.
Then you do it a
few time and then,
hmm, better try on my own.
And, of course, if you have my
recipe, you have no problem.
[LAUGHTER]
MARCIA GAGLIARDI:
Another person wanted
to find out, "what are your
favorite or most important food
items to have on hand?"
JACQUES PEPIN: On hand?
I mean, in refrigeration?
You're going to have eggs.
I mean, of course.
You are going to have certainly
onion, leek, scallion--
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: Cheese.
JACQUES PEPIN: I'm trying
to look in my refrigerator.
Sriracha-- I mean,
some hot sauce.
And truffle.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: Good.
JACQUES PEPIN: No, no.
You know, again, of
truffle, you use it.
I tell Claude, if you
have some left over,
you put it in the
refrigerator next to the beer.
Because when one person
say, do you have a beer?
I say, next to the truffle
in the refrigerator.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: Very high low.
Another person wrote-- you
get a compliment in this, too.
"You are a consummate
chef, a talented artist,
a prolific writer,
but I believe you're
the best culinary teacher
ever--" all in caps.
JACQUES PEPIN: Oh boy.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: I know.
Pat C in Oceanside.
Which of your talents
came the easiest to you
and which do you enjoy the most?
It's interesting.
You do have many talents.
JACQUES PEPIN: I
paint for 50 years.
And that kind of
gratifies, satisfies me
in one way, which
compliments maybe my cooking.
But on the whole, I am a cook.
That's basically what I am.
Even after I went to college and
studied, I could have taught.
And I taught literature
a little bit.
At some point, I taught skiing.
That's how I met my wife.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI:
You taught skiing?
Where were you teaching skiing?
JACQUES PEPIN: Upstate New York.
The Catskills.
That's when I was
working in New York.
But what I'm saying
is that, ultimately, I
go back to cooking.
That's what I love the best and
that's what I'm the best at.
But the rest of it can
complement your life
in a different way too.
But as long as I'm hungry,
then I will keep cooking.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: Yes.
And as long as you
have your good friend
here bringing you venison.
"What is one of the most
important life lessons
that a life in food
has taught you?"
JACQUES PEPIN: Well, I think the
cooks are very generous people.
They are giving people.
I see all of those chefs.
I go to the office of
any chef that I know.
I will ask five or six
requests every week
to give your time to cook
for cystic fibrosis, heart,
battered woman, this.
All of those organizations,
you want to raise money.
And someone want to talk
about the state of your heart.
If you have to pay $200 for
that, people won't come.
But if you have 10 chefs
coming, cooking, five wineries
and so forth, then people
will pay for those.
So a lot of those fundraising
are done through food.
And the chefs give a great
deal of their time for that.
The chefs are usually
very generous with time.
And this is part of who we are
because you cannot really cook
differently.
For me, you have to
be a technician first.
You have to know how to add--
that is, a professional chef,
particularly.
And if you happen
to have talent,
like someone like Thomas Keller
or Mark Franz at Farallon,
then you take that knowledge
you have in your hand,
you take it farther.
And if you put a
bit of love into it,
then you can really get
to extraordinary food.
I paint for, as I
say, many years.
But I'm not a good technician.
I didn't spend years and
years and years of my life
learning the
technique of painting.
So I may start something,
it come out halfway good.
I'm happy with myself.
Sometimes I paint over.
But I don't have as
much control that I
would have in the kitchen.
Yet however, if you spent
four, five years in art school
and learned the
law of perspective
and learn how to mix yellow
and blue to make green,
learn you do that
with your thumb,
you do that with a spatula.
Then you learn all the trick
of the trade, if you want.
And you can sit outside now and
do one painting after another.
Does that make you an artist?
Not really.
At that level, you're
a good technician.
You're a craftsmen.
And likewise, in the kitchen.
You can spend a few
years and really--
and I know many chefs
like that, working
pretty fast, good technician.
They can run a kitchen.
And they are relatively
lousy cook, the food is not.
You can still run a place.
Now, if you happen to
have talent, however,
and you're a good
technician, then you
can really take it higher.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: Another person
online wanted to find out,
"plesae tell us what you like
the least and the most of how
the internet has changed the
world of cooking, the kitchen,
and how we eat."
JACQUES PEPIN: Well,
I have an iPod.
No, iPhone I mean.
Claude doesn't have a computer,
doesn't have a iPhone,
doesn't have any of this.
So the computer has changed,
of course, a great deal of life
in the last 20 years,
but for us, probably
minimally in many ways.
I send email, I do
that type of thing,
but otherwise I can rely on my
wife to do that type of thing.
I don't really look at
the computer very much.
I look at TV.
I like TV.
Usually I look at either
PBS or CNN or thing
like this, or some old movie.
But I am not very
savvy with, I have
to say, unfortunately
with the computer.
I haven't really
learned much about it
and spent much time with it.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: Well, you
were on "Top Chef" as a judge.
Are there any TV
shows that you like
to watch, like with
Anthony Bourdain, or--
JACQUES PEPIN: Yeah,
I was on "The Chew"
a couple of weeks ago and I'm
supposed to go again soon.
I was on "The Taste," that
show with Anthony Bourdain,
not too long ago, and I
did "Top Chef" a few times.
But if I happen to know what
it is, if I don't miss it,
I will look at it.
But most of the time, I miss
it because you do it ahead
and I don't know when it comes.
And even my show.
Occasionally, my wife says,
Saturday, usually your PBS show
will show over the weekend.
My wife says, oh, you're on
at 4 o'clock this afternoon.
So I may look at it.
But very often we miss
it, because not there.
It's very exciting when you do
a book or a television show,
what I'm doing, so you have all
of them to get them excited.
But by the time
the book comes out,
after all of it and
the editing, you
don't even want to look at it.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI:
Yeah, you're done.
JACQUES PEPIN: And the
television, the excitement,
it's kind of gone.
And yeah, it's coming out now.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: You're already
moved onto your next thing.
JACQUES PEPIN: What
happened with PBS, too too,
I am lucky enough to be in
probably 90% of the market.
And there is about
470 stations or so.
But we don't really
keep track of it.
I don't, because it's
different in each town.
So I'll be in Des Moines,
Iowa, and they say,
how come you're not there on
Wednesday afternoon anymore?
I don't even know I'm there
on Wednesday afternoon.
The programmer take it in the
different city and program
the way they want.
I'll go somewhere, they
show me twice a week,
three times a week.
I go another place, they
don't show my show at all.
So it's hard to track it down.
Usually in Connecticut, it's
on Saturday and in New York
it's on Sunday.
And Long Island, it's on
Monday, for some reason.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI:
And what do you
think is one of the
most exciting cities
or cuisines to watch right now?
JACQUES PEPIN: This
is a leading question.
Well, frankly, I
don't think there's
any place like New York.
There is 24,000
restaurants in New York.
And the amount of ethnicity,
different type of group,
is just amazing.
And even not only in Manhattan.
You go into, well, Brooklyn
now, but in Queens.
In Queens, especially
Asian food around Flushing.
I went there on a little
sentimental journey
a few months ago for a magazine.
The magazine of Queens
wanted to feature me on that
because I worked for
Howard Johnson ten years.
It was in Queens Village.
At that point we
live in Flushing.
So we went back to
revisit those place.
And I was amazed at the
diversity, quality food,
and how cheap it was.
I have to say that San Francisco
is pretty close behind, too.
I don't know how many restaurant
there is in San Francisco.
But frankly, 20,
25 years ago, when
food started erupting
and so forth,
it was East Coast, West Coast--
New York, San Francisco.
And then the center of the city,
from Chicago to Philadelphia,
to Dallas started going.
And now you go to
very small town
and the chef-- there
has been so many
cooking school-- the
CIA, Culinary Institute
of America, Johnson & Wales.
And now there are thousand
and thousand and thousand
new chefs, which is
different than it used to be.
And those young chefs often
go back to a small town,
somewhere in the middle, and
open a small restaurant there,
which was not done
even 15, 20 years ago.
So it's very
exciting in that way.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: So in terms
of some questions from the room,
are we outfitted
with a microphone?
JACQUES PEPIN: Yeah, I have one.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: They can
come up and ask your yours.
So if anyone has some
questions for Jacques,
please come on up to the mic.
AUDIENCE: I just wanted
to ask, what dish have you
made the most?
JACQUES PEPIN: What dish
have I done the most?
Probably soup.
We always have soup at home
during the winter, too.
Often, what my wife
calls French soup--
open the refrigerator,
what's there
from salad leftover, a
carrot, this, that too.
In fact, I remember, the
first series that I did
called "Today's Gourmet."
It was in 1989, I
believe, at KQED.
And Claudine, my daughter, at
that time was in college at BU.
I teach at BU also
for 32 years now.
So Claudine was at BU, and
she came to the show with me.
And Peter Stein was the
producer at the time.
And we finished.
We went fast.
He say, you have
three minutes left.
What can you do?
I say, well let's do
a soup, or whatever.
So I went into the
refrigerator, pick up
the wilted carrot, a
piece of [INAUDIBLE].
I tell Claudine, what do you
have in your refrigerator
at school?
So she brought me
all that stuff.
She said, well,
we throw that out.
I said, uh-uh.
So I did a soup or
whatever I did with her,
and it was one of the segments
people loved the most.
[INAUDIBLE]
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: Love it.
JACQUES PEPIN: Thank you.
AUDIENCE: The relationships
with people around me
have a profound
influence on my cooking.
I tend to try to perfect dishes
that the people who I love
love.
And if I want to go home and
do something nice for my wife,
I've got a bouquet of flowers
and a bag of buckwheat flour
to make her blini.
I'm curious if the
relationships you have
have had a similar
influence on your cooking,
and is there a particular
dish that you've
tried to perfect to
make somebody happy?
JACQUES PEPIN: Well, you always
cook for the people love,
without any question-- for the
family, the most important.
But after 48 years
of marriage, my wife
may have asked my
advice years ago.
Now, usually, when I go into
the kitchen, she's cooking.
She don't tell me,
darling, what do you think?
She tells me, don't
touch anything.
So yes, being born in New
York from a Puerto Rican
mother and a Cuban father.
So there is some
Caribbean influence
in it, too, and taste.
And she loves Japanese cooking
as well as Vietnamese, too.
So she cooks some of that, we
cook some of that together.
But we do cook together.
But after those
years, so many years,
we don't even have
to talk too much.
We have our area, which have
been pretty much divided
throughout the years.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI:
Like the closet.
AUDIENCE: Hi.
It's great to be here.
Thank you.
I'm reading the book, "The Third
Plate" by Dan Barber right now,
the future of our plate.
And I was wondering what
you thought about that.
What would be-- what does our
plate look like in the future?
JACQUES PEPIN: I'm sorry,
I couldn't-- I'm old.
AUDIENCE: So that's the
future of our plate.
What does our plate look
like in our future--
near future, far future.
What does our plate look like?
JACQUES PEPIN: What our food
will look like in general?
What I hope that--
actually, there is hope.
We are going back, it
seems to me, more the way
we cooked many years ago.
Maybe not the way.
I talk about my mother--
my mother died a month
and a half ago.
She was 99 and 1/2, too.
And I went to see her
in July this summer.
I talk about my
mother and my father.
I said, my mother was
an organic farmer.
My father, too.
Well, the word organic
did not exist anyway.
But since chemical
fertilizer did not
exist either and
fungicide, insecticide,
pesticide did not exist
either, everyone was organic.
That was the way it was.
In addition to this, my mother
had a small restaurant there,
which may sound
pretty romantic now,
which we didn't think it
was romantic at the time.
My brother and I,
before going to school
in the morning at 8
o'clock, at 6:30, 7 o'clock,
we followed her to the market.
There was no car at the time.
Market was about a
mile, half a mile long.
She walked one way, look at
the ingredient, buy on the way
back.
Everyone knew her.
So she going to buy a case
of mushroom, which you know
is dark.
She know the guy's
got to sell it.
He cannot give it to her.
And she want to argue
the price and so forth.
Get back to her
restaurant, start cooking
for her lunch and dinner.
Remember, there was no
refrigeration at the time.
There was an icebox.
So she bought a block
of ice every day
to put her fish and her meat.
It would have to be finished by
the day, her vegetables, too.
So the day after,
everything was new again.
So all the product were organic
because nothing else existed.
It was not a big deal.
And everything was
fresh, and too,
because you didn't have
refrigeration or freezer.
So it was a different
type of thing,
which was very menial and
very ordinary at the time,
is coming back now, in
a sense-- the vengeance
of something very fancy.
Organic food, local food,
and stuff like this.
But we come to
exaggerate in America
going one end to the
other end of the spectrum.
And now you have
an organic food.
I've been in a restaurant where
they bring the carrot to me
and said, that carrot
is called Nella.
She was born on the
7th of December.
[LAUGHTER]
That's my carrot?
So it can go a little
too far this way too.
I hope we get away
from processed food.
Processed food is the
worst thing you can eat.
If you start looking
at what's in it,
first you don't know what it is.
And according to my grandmother,
you should never eat anything
you cannot recognize
to start with.
And on those things,
not only it becomes
dangerous the kids
are eating this.
And now I have seen young
kids not only recognizing
the product, but recognizing
the color of the box.
I want the red box, or
I want the blue box.
And by the time we get away
from food, that much-- I mean,
that kid should know that a
chicken's got a head and feet.
It's not a square thing
with plastic on top.
So we try to teach the kids,
take them to the garden,
get stuff out of the ground
to make them test it,
and so forth.
And it's not that complicated.
My granddaughter, she doesn't
like to weed the garden,
but she does a great job anyway.
Anyway, so I hope the future is
more than the food of the past.
And it seems that it's
coming back, certainly, here
at Google.
I have been here before
at your restaurant.
I was very impressed by
the quality of the food
that you serve,
the employees too.
I was even more
impressed by the price.
No one paid anything.
[LAUGHTER]
That's amazing.
AUDIENCE: Thank you.
JACQUES PEPIN: Thank you.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI:
So we are going
to be looking forward to "Heart
and Soul," launching in fall
of 2015, and take this wonderful
trip through your memories
and all these
people in your life,
and to see some of the places
that are part of your home.
JACQUES PEPIN:
Thank you very much.
I'm looking forward to it, too.
And I hope I continue to do
some show with my granddaughter
and with my daughter
and with my friend.
If not, it's OK.
The world of chef has
changed tremendously.
And as I said, when we
get into that business,
we didn't want into
that business, quote,
"to become famous,"
because at that time when
we work in Paris, we go
out dancing somewhere.
And you invite a girl and
she says, what do you do?
You say, I'm a cook.
Even at the Plaza Athenee
or the great place in Paris,
it was pretty low
on the social scale.
Now it's very, very different.
And the chefs are recognized
in many ways, maybe too much.
And I know that at the French
Culinary Institute in New York
or at BU, when
I'm there teaching
and you have a student coming
to talk to me for an exit
interview.
And they say, Chef, I have a
great idea for a cooking show.
I have a great
idea to do a book.
They don't even know how
to peel a carrot yet.
And so this is not
the right reason
to go into that business,
because it's very likely
that it will never happen.
And you still work
12 hours a day.
You still get varicose veins by
the time you're 40 years old.
And you sweat a lot, and you
work Saturday and Sunday.
And you're not paid
that much, unless you
get at the last echelon.
Don't get into that business
to, quote, "become famous."
But if you do it for
the right reason--
that it gratifies
you, that you're
happy to cook for someone, it
pleases you, makes you happy,
the type of life that you want
to do-- then, well, you'll
be happy.
And maybe you'll
become famous, too.
It may happen.
But even if it doesn't,
you'll have a happy life.
I mean, I've been cooking
for over 60 years.
When people see me,
usually they smile.
I bring pleasure to
the life of people.
If I were a doctor,
they'd kind of
look at me with not
too much anticipation.
So it's a good life to be in if
you go in for the right reason,
I think.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI:
Wonderful advice.
It's been such an honor
to speak with you today.
JACQUES PEPIN: Thank you.
Thank you very much.
MARCIA GAGLIARDI: And
to hear your stories.
Thank you so much for your time.
[APPLAUSE]
