Ah, Jacques. We know you as Julia Child’s favorite cooking buddy. A master of high French cuisine. Fabulous exotic ingredients. White tablecloths. Complex multi-day culinary projects. Three-day cassoulet anyone? A PBS TV charmer with your daughter Claudine. But we’ve never thought about what you eat for dinner. At home. Night after night.

Jacques’ new 2024 book—because we all call him “Jacques” don’t we?—Cooking My Way is an invitation to his knife-scarred kitchen table. The subtitle: Recipe and Techniques for Economical Cooking says it all. It’s a slimish blue book, illustrated by Jacques with his charming watercolors, and stocked with easy-to-prepare meals you would like to make for your family, to keep them cozy and sated in the silent days of a New England winter. (Lots of great recipes for summer bounty as well! But that’s for another story.)

While I tend to think of Jacques Pépin as the high professor of technique and finicky cooking, this book takes a different direction. It’s commonsense, easy-to-prepare comfort foods (mostly), with excellent and masterful prose instructions, and relies primarily on ingredients you likely have in your fridge right now—or that are easily fetchable from the local grocery store. Soups, salads, eggs, breads, pastas, veggies, proteins, and desserts. Each one a gem. All slightly elevated from your typical weeknight dinner and most fit for your next shoes-off dinner party. Jacques’ emphasis is on “thrifty,” a word he uses throughout. Lots of substitutions to make dinner (or lunch or brunch) easy to assemble from inexpensive ingredients already at hand.

There’s emphasis on what I like to call “second acts.” More commonly leftovers and by-products. Make the stock from the chicken bones, buy the vegetables and fruits in season, and preserve them simply. Don’t buy expensive fish or produce out of season. Jacques doesn’t like the concept of leftovers, reheated and lacking the verve of their first appearance. He suggests buying and preparing just enough of any dish and reusing whatever is left in a different guise. The stew becomes a soup. The chicken becomes a hash. The vegetables a filling for a quiche or an omelet.

Born into a family of cooks, Jacques came of age in France at the end of WWII. Food was scarce. His mother was an imaginative and resourceful cook who developed recipes from the limited staples on hand. These are the updated versions of the recipes Jacques grew up with, and we all benefit from his early experiences as his mother stretched the larder and the franc.

Since none of the recipes is complex, what I’d like to share is a full-on three-course meal, winter-friendly and courtesy of Jacques.

I love recipes that inspire me to give spur-of-the-moment dinner parties, like the following three dishes. So, should you decide to drop in chez-moi this season, just give me a few hours of advance notice!

Cream Cheese Souffles

Servings 2

Ingredients
  

  • ½ teaspoon unsalted butter for buttering the molds
  • 2 tablespoons grated Parmesan cheese
  • 1 (8-ounce) tub whipped cream cheese
  • 1 large egg preferably organic
  • 1 tablespoon minced fresh chives
  • teaspoon fine sea salt
  • teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

Instructions
 

  • For an elegant first course or a nice dinner, you can serve these easy soufflés in individual containers or spooned from a larger mold. If you want to bake them ahead and let them cool to room temperature, they will shrink down slightly and could be unmolded for another presentation.
    For an elegant firstcourse or a nice dinner, you can serve these easy soufflés in individualcontainers or spooned from a larger mold. If you want to bake them ahead andlet them cool to room temperature, they will shrink down slightly and could beunmolded for another presentation.

 

Lamb Chops Champvallon

Servings 6

Ingredients
  

  • 1 tablespoon peanut oil
  • 6 lamb shoulder chops (about 2½ pounds total)
  • 2 onions(about 8 ounces) sliced(about 2 cups)
  • cups water
  • 6 or 7 garlic cloves thinly sliced (about 2 tablespoons)
  • teaspoons fine sea salt
  • ¾ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
  • pounds Yukon Gold potatoes peeled, sliced thin, and placed in a bowl with cold water to cover
  • 3 thyme sprigs
  • 2 bay leaves
  • ¼ cup coarsely chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley for garnish

Instructions
 

  • The classic dish côtelettes d’agneau Champvallon is made with lamb chops from the rack, but in this variation, I use shoulder blade chops. This cut is meaty and tasty, and less expensive than the traditional chop. The shoulder blade chops are sautéed first and then water is added to the pan. Neither stock nor wine is needed with lamb, which has plenty of flavor on its own. The chops are then braised in the oven with sliced potatoes, herbs, onion, and garlic. The braising liquid should be almost completely absorbed by the time the lamb and potatoes are finished cooking and ready to serve. The dish is as good reheated as fresh.
    Preheat the oven to 375°.
    Heat the oil in a large skillet over high heat. When hot, add the lamb chops (3 at a time, if necessary, to avoid crowding) and cook for about 4 minutes per side, until nicely browned. Arrange in one layer in a large gratin dish.
    Add the onions to the drippings in the pan and sauté, stirring for about 2 minutes. Add the water, garlic, salt, and pepper.
    Drain the potato slices well and arrange them on top of the lamb chops, with the thyme and bay leaves. Pour the onion mixture and pan juices over the dish.
    Place the gratin dish on a rimmed baking sheet and bake for 45 minutes. Cover with aluminum foil and bake for another 30 minutes, or until the potatoes are soft, the lamb is tender, and most of the juices have been absorbed. Allow to sit for a few minutes to develop flavor before serving.
    Remove the bay leaves, garnish with the parsley, and serve.

Louisa Kasdon is amazed that she has had over 500 food articles published. She also hosts the podcast letstalkaboutfood.com. A longtime resident of Cambridge, she now lives in Cohasset with her husband and is thrilled every time her daughters and family come to visit them.

Pears in Mint and Tea

Servings 6

Ingredients
  

  • 2 cups water
  • 2 large lemons
  • ½ cup sugar
  • 6 firm Bartlett pears (about 2 pounds) peeled, quartered lengthwise, and cored
  • 1 black tea bag (orange pekoe or another tea to your liking)
  • 1 teaspoon cornstarch dissolved in 2 teaspoons water
  • cup shreddedfresh mint leaves plus6 whole sprigs, for garnish (optional)

Instructions
 

  • I usually use Bartlett pears in this recipe, but you can use another variety. It took 15minutes for the wedges of pear to cook when I last prepared this recipe, but they may be tender in half the time if very ripe, or they may take up to 25minutes if they are less so. Test them occasionally as they cook with the point of a knife or a fork. Remove them from the heat as soon as they are tender and let them cool in their own juices.
    Pour the water into a medium saucepan. With a vegetable peeler, remove the lemon peel in long strips and add them to the saucepan. Cut the lemons in half and squeeze the juice into the saucepan. Add the sugar and mix to combine.
    Place the pear wedges in the saucepan. Add the black tea bag and bring the mixture to a boil over high heat. Cover, reduce the heat to low, and cook for 10 to 15 minutes, until the pear pieces are tender when pierced with the point of a knife or with a fork. Remove from the heat.
    Immediately add the dissolved cornstarch to the saucepan and stir it into the juices to thicken them slightly. Let the pears cool in the syrup.
    When ready to serve, remove the tea bag and discard. Stir the mint gently into the syrup. Divide the pears among six plates (4 wedges per plate). Spoon some of the syrup over the pears, garnish with the mint sprigs, if desired, and serve.

Notes

You may use a mint-flavored herbal tea bag instead of fresh mint. Add it to the saucepan along with the black tea bag and remove and discard both tea bags before serving.