- Hi, I'm Jacques Pepin.

- And I'm Claudine Pepin.

- I love to cook meals based on the freshest ingredient of the season.

- But some things are good all the time, right, papa?

- Right.

So today, we're doing a menu you can do any time of year.

We start with halibut with an olive and tomato sauce; poule au riz is like a chicken and rice stew that my mother used to make; a salad of beets and pecan dressed with vinegar and chili sauce is very refreshing; and stuffed dates with Armagnac, a simple year-round dessert.

- Whether it's a mid-summer evening or a cold winter night, good food is always in season.

- That's exactly my philosophy.

- Join us for "A Menu for All Seasons," next on "Jacques Pepin's Kitchen."

- "Encore with Claudine."

- Hi, today we're starting with "A Menu for All Seasons."

All seasons meaning, I can make it anytime I want, right?

- Anytime you want- - Okay.

(chuckling) - You can do it.

And we start with those.

You know what those are?

- Big fish.

- Big fish, yes.

- Yes.

- Those are halibut, and this is the belly filet actually.

So you can see that that one would be at least as big of that, and this is an Alaska halibut.

And you can see how the flesh is white- - Yeah.

- And waxy and so forth.

We're going to remove the skin, which is very thick here.

- Is that something that- - (mumbling) at that skin.

- [Claudine] That you would make steaks with?

- Yeah, yeah.

- Big steaks.

- This is what we are- - Okay.

- Going to do.

Look at that, that skin here, you can also cook it on the skin, but usually the skin is a bit tough.

The smaller one here is a Pacific halibut, and it's very nice.

Sometime I've done those stuff all.

We remove the filet, like one of those filet.

You follow, there is a central bone in the center here, we cut along the side here.

And actually, you know what, I should use that type of knife because it's flexible.

- Okay.

- To go this way along the bone, cut here.

Have you ever boned a fish like that, Claudine?

- [Claudine] No, I usually ask you how to do it, and then you do it.

- That's true.

- Yep.

- This is for filet, if you do it this way.

You see, this is in the French style, we do the filet this way.

There is a bone here, we do the belly filet, turn it on the other side, do the same thing on the other side.

It's nice.

As you can see that fish is the darker flesh than that one, the type of halibut that you have.

And again, we're going to remove the skin here, maybe using that bigger knife.

Do you want to try that?

- Okay.

- So jigsaw fashion, like this.

And you keep your knife this way, not flat, not horizontal, but 45 degree angle, and you move it this way.

- I like the flipping part, I can do that.

- Okay, get closer to the board.

That's it, you stay practically on the board.

Keep pulling.

That's it.

This actually is a larger one.

Maybe we use the larger one, and we cut filet.

We're going to broil them and serve them with a sauce.

Antiboise as we call from Antibes.

So we put that, let's put some salt/pepper on top of that, a little bit of olive oil.

- Okay, salt/pepper's- - So I put- - On your side.

- Salt/pepper there for you.

Yes, just to oil it on each side like this.

And we are going to put that directly under the broiler while we do the sauce now.

Okay?

Like this one.

And close to about four inches from the broiler, so we want to do this.

Now we do the sauce.

- All right, lemme just clean up 'cause it's yucky.

- You're a good cleaner.

- Thank you very much.

(Jacques mumbling) You've been trained well.

(Claudine chuckling) Okay, so let's see now, I'm going to put a little bit of onion in there, put a little bit of olive oil in the thing.

Give it to me.

- Okay, so I can do.

- Okay, yeah, that's it.

- Fine.

- That's it.

And some onion.

I'm gonna start sauteing some chopped onion I have here, we're gonna start sauteing this.

- I love that smell.

- Yeah, smells good.

- Onions and olive oil.

- And tomato, we're gonna blanch the tomato.

- Okay.

- So remove the peduncle, that part of it.

- Okay.

- Then we drop it in there.

If the tomato is really ripe, 10, 15 second is enough.

The greener it is, the longer you leave it in there.

- Ah!

- You can also peel your tomato by burning it on top of the stove, the skin comes off, to do any of this.

See, that should be enough right there.

What is that for?

- To cool it off, so you can touch it.

- No, no.

You see this is stand out to do that too, but I don't like to do it because- - Why?

- It washed the tomato out, takes some of the taste out of it.

Look at that.

- Oh!

- This is perfectly fine here.

Cut it in half.

Yup.

We do two tomato.

- Sure.

- Oh, well, I thought- - Two tomatoes are always better.

(Jacques mumbling) Okay, well, why don't you press the seed out of this?

- Okay.

- See, you would want to keep the seed, the juice, the skin, all of that goes into your stomach.

Okay, well, we cut it into large piece like this.

And you know what, you peel that one now.

- Great.

- And you start here, at that part because it's already cut up, and so it's easy to- - Oh, okay.

- You see.

- As long as I don't have to hold it.

Oh!

- Well, okay, we have tomato in there.

I'm going to put a little bit of fresh thyme in there, and you don't have to cut it very fine, just coarsely like this to give taste to the sauce.

Okay, I think now I'm going to see if the fish is ready to be turned.

- Okay.

- I think it should be ready to be turned now.

So you shred this one coarsely and you add it to this.

- I will, I promise.

- Okay.

Let me see what it looks like.

Good.

That's good here.

It's a very flaky type of fish.

- It looks really nice.

- Good.

Yeah, you want it very flaky.

All right.

And then we just have the time to finish the sauce, so let's increase the temperature here.

You put the other tomato there?

- Yep.

- Okay, that's good.

You know what we do?

Put a little bit of water in there.

- Okay, here you go.

- Here, I have the water from here.

Make your liquid like this.

- Hmm.

- See, you don't want the tomato to be too cooked just with still a little bit of raw tomato taste.

Put salt and pepper in there, I think that need it.

- Okay.

Do we want olives and basil?

I know we're supposed to do in there.

- We are going to put basil and olive, yes, and I'm gonna cut it for you.

I undo that.

You would wanna put that at the end to get maximum effect.

And though they're Kalamata olive, you don't want to let them cook in there because it'll discolor.

You want to take the pit out of it, like those have the pit in it.

Just crush it with your hand or something flat like this, you crush it like this.

- Mm-hmm.

- The thing comes out of it very easily now.

- [Claudine] Hmm.

- You're eating the pit?

- Yeah.

(chuckling) No, I'm eating the profit.

- Okay, here we are, there.

I'm gonna give you that in there.

A little bit of a chiffonade, what we call a chiffonade when we gather things together and cut it into thin strip like this.

It's wrinkle, it's wrinkle-looking like the word "chiffon," in France the material, so we call that a chiffonade.

So you do a chiffonade.

That's cooked enough, I don't want a puree all of this.

Let me get the... - The fish is good?

- Beautiful, yes.

That's fine.

- Ooh, that looks really nice.

- Well, gimme the plate- - For it, yep.

Here's a plate.

- All right, let's put a little bit of that sauce in the bottom.

What do you think?

- Oh, that'll look really pretty.

- Like this.

Like a bed of a sauce like this.

- Hmm.

- And we can put a little bit on top, if you want after.

I'll put it this way, one.

Well, this is just, just, just cooked.

- Do you want some on top?

- Yeah.

I'm in it for three piece, I'll eat the other one in the kitchen.

- There.

- That's fine.

- Done.

- Maybe a little spring of thyme here.

Not even necessary.

And this is it, our beautiful halibut Antiboise to start.

- I am lucky enough to be tasting some wonderful Chardonnay here with Jeff Dawson who's gonna explain to me how to taste Chardonnay properly.

- Well, what we're gonna do is not taste Chardonnay properly, but try and find out the flavors and aromas in the Chardonnay, and figure out how we can use those flavors and aromas to pair them with food.

- Oh, that sounds good!

- So the first thing we need to do is, we need to taste the wine.

- I like that idea.

It's got a beautiful color.

- [Jeff] And at our winery, what we do is, we look to the garden to find the descriptors that describe the flavors and aromas.

- [Claudine] Oh, wow!

- [Jeff] First thing I wanna do is, is swirl the glass of wine, and that opens up the wine and lets the aromas release into the air.

- Oh!

- And then you really wanna get your nose in the glass.

- Okay.

- And you can get a big shot of the aromas that are coming off the wine.

- Oh, great!

I taste fruit.

- Fruit is a very predominant flavor in Chardonnay.

You have tropical fruits, such as papaya, pineapple, banana, and then there's other fruits such as pear, apple, melon, and citrus.

- Oh, wow!

- So by identifying the flavors and aromas in the wine, in this case fruit, it's a big fruity wine.

We've got pears in the nose- - Hmm.

- And peaches, maybe a little pineapple and papaya in there also.

Then we can look at the foods we're going to use to pair with these and see whether those work in terms of being similar.

- Mm-hmm.

- Or using a contrast.

And grilled foods work really well, things that have been smoked.

- Oh, good.

- And that's a contrast to the fruitiness and the slight sweetness that you pick up from the wine.

- I absolutely love Chardonnay.

- Well, Chardonnay is America's favorite white wine.

- Oh, really?

- Yes.

- Oh, that's amazing!

Well, it's a great wine to eat with, so happy eating.

- Happy drinking.

(glasses clinking) (upbeat music) - We are going to do a poule au riz.

This is real family food.

- Definitely.

- Remember eating that at your grandmother?

- Always.

- My mother in Leon, poaching the chicken, serving it with rice, and with all the vegetable.

I take the skin out of this, we're gonna take the skin out of it too.

- [Claudine] But mummy uses a hen.

- Yes, and this is a bouquet garni.

I have a rib of celery, different type of herb, parsley, sage, bay leaf here.

I'm going to attach this.

Do you have a pot for me there?

- Yep.

- Okay.

- There a belly for stray bay leaf.

- We have a pot.

Okay, how much water are you having there?

- Four quarts.

- Four quart.

So we put that this way down.

- Breast.

- I mean, breast side down, the bouquet garni.

I put the neck and the gizzard also.

Here you can remove that thing because the chicken was on it.

- Great.

- You didn't touch the chicken so- - No, I'm good to go.

- You have to clean your finger.

I have a large leek here, she's going to go- - Just like that?

- In there too.

Yep, yep.

We have carrot, with our whole carrot around.

Turnips and parsnips, right?

- Okay.

- Here.

You can see, if I peel this as I'm peeling it now, you may say, "I just peeled it and it's okay."

Well, it's not really okay here.

This is the time of the year where the turnips have to be trimmed a lot to remove that thick, heavy skin.

You see inside here, that yellow line?

- Yeah.

What is that?

- This is like fiber.

- [Claudine] Oh, so you have to take that out?

- Yeah.

- Oh!

- So this one is fine in there.

We do this.

We put an onion.

So all of our garish in it, we put salt.

And this is a very large parsnip that you have here.

- Well, you take whatever you want.

- Yeah, we take the end of it, this.

We could cut this in two or three pieces, that give a lot of taste.

Those root vegetable are very good- - I love root vegetables.

- For you, anyway, yeah.

So it's really country, this will go down as it's cooked.

So on top of it, you don't want the lid, which fit on top of the whole thing, you want the lid like this one.

Yes, which go right inside to apply pressure on the vegetable as it cooked, and which is what we are going to do here.

And that has to come to a boil from that point.

When it boil, you simmer it gently for 30 minutes, and then you leave it for like an hour in the bowling stock, and it continue cooking gently.

And that's what we have here.

And as you can see, this is right on top of it.

- [Claudine] Now that looks nice.

- Yes.

- And it smells very good.

- I'm gonna put this in there, Claudine.

Let me see that.

So I'll drain it slowly.

If I lift it up too fast, going to go all over the place.

Good idea.

(Claudine chuckling) To prevent gripping, yeah.

- Yep.

- Put it down there, and I'm gonna put the whole thing here.

I'm going to bone out the chicken anyway, so I leave it up like this.

Okay, good, with the leek and all of this.

- Oh, wow!

- All of the vegetable.

Good.

- This with some mustard, and I'm such a happy camper.

- Yes.

Okay.

You know what, it's a little too hard to handle it now, so what we're going to start is the rice.

We are doing rice with this.

One of the things that you want to do... Give me that little bowl over there.

- There you go.

- Try to remove at that point as much fat as you can from the surface.

Push the surface on one side, then turn it around and pick up some of the fat, if you can.

All right.

- All right.

- So what we'll do in there is to put... This is jasmine rice.

- Oh.

- So we put a cup- - I love jasmine rice.

- A cup and a half of jasmine rice, of scallion, and approximately four... Well, I have a cup and a half of jasmine rice, so I need three cup of liquid.

Three cup of liquid.

And of course, I'm using that beautiful stock now, which is nice and clear.

- Oh, that's gonna be awesome.

- Two, well, this is four cup, so it's about three cup here.

Okay.

Ooh, this is hot.

- It's a good way to start.

- All right.

Good way to start.

I will cover this.

Cover this, and you let it boil gently for about 15, 20 minute.

And during that time... Because this is a bit too hot to handle, let's do our salad there.

- We'll make the beets.

- Okay, so.

- I have salad, you have beets.

- You have salad, just mix your salad.

- I gotta dry it.

- Dry, okay.

- I love this thing.

- And on top of this, we're going to put... Well, we can do our dressing.

We can actually do our dressing in there, or we can do it.

This is a great salad spinner, right?

- Yeah, it's got a brake and everything.

- Onion, a little bit of crushed nuts.

Here I have pecan nuts.

You want to put some vinegar (mumbling) - Okay.

- Some oil, a bit of sugar.

- Sugar.

- A bit of salt, a bit of pepper.

- Oil.

- [Jacques] And a little bit of the- - Chili.

- Chili garlic paste.

Okay, let me mix it in there.

You can bring the plate, if you want.

- Okay.

- That's it.

- Yeah.

- The beet are cooked.

You can cook your beet in water, you can cook them in the oven, you can cook them in the microwave, if you want to go faster.

- In the microwave?

- Then you have... Yes.

And then you have to peel them and cut them into pieces like that, fresh beet.

I love fresh beet.

- There.

Does that look nice or what?

- Well, hold it up in here.

Okay, thank you.

- I tried.

- Good.

- Getting my presentation skills down.

(chuckling) - No, this is beautiful.

It had a natural look to bring it this way, this is great.

- Yeah, and also it'll season the salad.

So here we go, here's the salad.

- Okay.

Shall we finish our chicken?

- Let's go.

- I hope it's cool enough, so- - I think so.

- Bring me that here.

- I hope so too.

- And I'm going to give you the leek.

Whoop, here, take the string out of it.

The bouquet garni here, which is the mixture of herb and all that, that we discard.

So all my vegetable, I'm going to leave on the side.

And here, as you can see, this is going to fall apart very easily.

And what I want to do is to remove the skin out of that and remove the meat, but see the meat will fall apart.

All I have to say, right, take a little bowl and take that skin out of it.

- Okay, I'll use this one, it's already dirty.

- Yeah, good idea.

You can see how moist it is.

Okay, I have the vegetable to serve with it.

The neck, we don't use it.

(Claudine mumbling) And what you would want to have here is all of my vegetable, but if for example, we can serve it now because I have another rice.

Yeah, that rice is cooked here.

Yeah, okay.

And we serve that the poule au riz family style with (indistinct) like this with cornichon, the small sour- - The gherkins.

- Gherkin, and some Swiss cheese.

- Hmm.

(Jacques mumbling) - So here for me, I have the rice.

- Oh, it smells so good, (Jacques mumbling) the jasmine rice.

- Yeah, because this is the jasmine rice, it does smell.

So I would put that amount of rice.

Notice that I'm keeping some rice in the bottom here.

- For seconds?

- For second, no, not even.

(Claudine chuckling) I wanna show you something else with it.

- Okay.

- I'm gonna put it here.

This is the other rice, it's not quite cooked.

And we put our chicken on top of it and the vegetable, you can start putting your chicken, placing your chicken there.

Let's say, the two breast, put in pieces like this.

The dark meat, we put it all around.

And now I want to put some of the vegetable around, like here, the leek.

Okay, good.

Here we are, there.

And then you can put a little bit of liquid on top of this.

And that's how you serve it at the table nice and hot like this with the rice underneath.

That's how your grandmother serve it.

- Yes.

- You wanna put it there?

- Yeah.

- Now if you have some vegetable leftover after you've served, like I did here, now here is what you do, your chicken, just shred your chicken over there.

- Here's this.

- Shred your chicken.

- Shredding.

- I cut that very coarsely, everything is well cooked here.

And this is what we do usually the day after, you have some rice leftover, we add that to the rice.

- [Claudine] Here's the chicken.

- We add the chicken.

So I'll start to put the chicken in there.

And of course- - Okay.

- A lot of stock that you have left also, and you do the best soup.

This is the day after.

- The day after soup, which is also (Jacques mumbling) very good to freeze.

- Yes, you would freeze that, but here- - Oh!

- This is a beautiful soup.

- That is a beautiful soup.

- That you can freeze and serve another four people with it.

- Okay, let's make some dessert real quick.

- Simple dessert, okay.

- Simple, quick, speedy dessert.

- And this is a stuffed- - Date.

- A stuffed date.

So what you do?

Do you wanna crush a little bit of this in there?

My hand, maybe I rinse my hand while you're crushing this.

Okay.

- They're crushed.

- See you crush any type of cookie that you want in there?

A little bit of lemon juice in there right through my hand here.

- I already have some (Jacques mumbling) that I made earlier.

- Some may.

- So that's gonna work really well.

I'm gonna start stuffing this.

- I put this one because I like the chocolate chip cookie, right?

- [Claudine] Yes.

- A little bit of Armagnac or Cognac, if you want.

If you don't want to put any alcohol, it's fine, you can choose.

A little bit of mint, shred some mint or crush it like this in there.

And coarsely you do a kind of mixture, kind of coarse like this.

And this is what we stuff.

- Ooh!

- I mean, like this.

And we are about ready to go to the dining room, right?

- Sounds good.

- We're about to get ready.

So this is our dessert- - Stuffed.

- For the stuff, (Claudine chuckling) stuffed it with Armagnac and cookie.

Today this is our menu for all season, right?

- And you're a papa for all seasons too.

- All season.

- Yep.

- Okay.

- Well, we have the chicken, just like mummy used to make it.

- Exactly.

- And with that, we have the (indistinct) Dijon mustard, which is wonderful to serve it with.

We have the beet salad with the chili sauce, which is really zippy, and I think it's gonna be wonderful.

It's even gonna be good tomorrow.

- Mm-hmm.

- And we have the huge, huge stuffed dates.

- Medjool date, they are grown in- - Medjool.

- California now around Palm Springs, they're fantastic.

- [Claudine] And we have the fish with the Antiboise, which you're gonna explain to me, please.

- Yes, well, Antiboise is from the town of Antibes on the Riviera, south of France, so we have tomato, olives, basil, so right in the style of Antibes.

- Good, and we're gonna have some wine with this.

- So what did you choose for wine?

- Well, for me, I chose a red wine from the Douro region in Portugal, it's very fruity and very acidic.

- Hmm, and for me, I choose Chardonnay Reserve from the Santa Maria Valley with a taste of pineapple, it's very powerful too.

And I think it's even going to be even better than Claudine's wine (Claudine chuckling) with my chicken.

So until next time- (glasses clinking) - Happy cooking.

- Happy cooking.

(upbeat music)