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In conversation with Laura Werlin
Interview, reception, book-signing in honor of the newly published Chez
Jacques
Monday, May 21, 2007 / Fairmont Hotel, San Francisco
Writeup by: Christina Mueller Welter
Jacques Pépin joined Laura Werlin, SFPFS member and freelance food
writer, in a lively conversation May 21 in the Fairmont Hotel’s Crown
Room for our second educational forum, or Stirring the Pot, of the year.
Pépin was visiting San Francisco in honor of Chez Jacques: Traditions
and Rituals of a Cook (Stewart, Tabori & Chang), his most personal book
to date. In this lush, coffee-table-sized book, favorite recipes mingle
with personal lore, photographs and Pépin’s own artwork to form an
illustrated memoir.
Werlin focused her questions around the book’s format, eliciting stories
of Pépin’s life with food, family and art. Punctuated by his sly wit,
their hour-long conversation rambled through Pépin’s memory trove and
personal beliefs about becoming and being a chef. He discussed his
notion of culinary identity and how it is built on rituals unique to
each of us.
Pépin has witnessed a huge change in America’s food supply. Forty years
ago, one could buy only canned mushrooms at the supermarket. Now any
mainstream grocery store offers eight types of them fresh. “Most taste
like nothing but there are eight kinds,” he said.
Utterly down-to-earth despite his celebrity, Pépin holds strong beliefs
about food and cooking. He commented on the recent concern over
carbon-neutral consumerism. “The issue of the ‘carbon footprint’ of food
doesn’t really matter when half the world is still dying of hunger,” he
said. But Pépin also strongly believes that what is closest to you, from
your own garden, is best.
Responding to audience questions, Pépin had strong words about The Food
Network. With an entire network devoted to food, he wondered: why is
there “no dietitian on board, no guidelines provided for what food is
cooked on their shows, and yet we have no answer for why we are getting
obese.” Why isn’t there a program telling us HOW we should eat, he
wonders. On the flip side, he noted, the Food Network and the rise of
the celebrity chef have made cooking an accepted career. “It used to be
everyone wanted to marry a doctor or a lawyer or an architect. Now it’s
OK to marry a chef!”
Pépin closed with anecdotes of Julia Child’s on-set antics. He left the
impression that he still enjoys his work and takes great pleasure from
his colleagues, painting and family. “If I were to come back after
death, I would choose to come back as Jacques Pépin,” he said.
A reception immediately succeeded the discussion and featured recipes
from Chez Jacques. Not a morsel was left behind.
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Chez
Jacques: An Evening with Jacques Pépin
