Meet around the table

With his new cookbook, Tablées – The pleasure of meeting each other, Chef Jean-François Plante offers unifying, festive and gourmet menus to welcome loved ones around the table, the time to savor a meal that will be remembered for a long time. We spoke to him on the occasion of this very special holiday season which promises to be reunited, even if it is in reduced format.

Laila Maalouf
Press

It is a book born in anticipation. The expectation of finally being able to receive guests at his table and see them smile while discovering dishes concocted with passion.

“It’s an act of love when we cook. It is instantaneous self-satisfaction when you see in people’s faces all the pleasure of eating what has been prepared for them. It is a delight for a craftsman; there is nothing more satisfying, ”says Jean-François Plante.

If he has made cooking his profession, the chef confides that his great pleasure in life is to entertain. Because, as he writes so well in his book, “without guests to satisfy, the best of chefs lack inspiration, magic, momentum, breath”. Hence the frustration felt since the start of the pandemic, which pushed him to imagine dishes that would make it possible to make up, in a way, these missed opportunities around the table, especially during the last Holidays.

The recipes of Tables all have in common that they are made from easy-to-find ingredients and prepared in innovative ways. They are then paired with other plates that combine the same flavors to compose themed, varied and well thought-out menus – raw, large, with a glass of red, for a late dinner …

“I like working with products that are accessible and inexpensive, but that can be transformed to make them interesting. My concern is that everyone can reproduce the recipes that I offer, regardless of whether they live in Saguenay or Lacolle… For me, this is fundamental, ”says Jean-François Plante.

The kitchen, a family legacy

When he talks about his passion and his values ​​in the kitchen, the chef thinks back to his grandmother Mélina, who lived at the house and who did “miracles at a time when we cooked with not much”, just by force. of love, know-how and taste.

“I remember the fricassee she made with leftover Sunday roast beef; it was like a party at home, it was magical, ”he recalls with emotion.

It is moreover to her that he owes his passion. At the age of 5 or 6, he was already having fun making dressings and sauces for the family of three boys.

Among other things, he keeps in mind the culinary show The wacky gourmet (French version of The Galloping Gourmet), which he listened to with so much interest at the time – “like it was a children’s show”.

Since then, cooking – and gluttony – has never ceased to be at the heart of his life.

The table, like “a beautiful large fresco”

When he entertains, what he likes is using large serving plates and letting his guests help themselves as they please. “I find that there is nothing more beautiful. We do not need centerpieces with dishes that are beautiful, friendly and gourmet ”, emphasizes Jean-François Plante.

Tables also insists on the importance of thinking about the decor for a successful meal that delights both the taste buds and the pupils. We will thus pay attention to all these details that make the difference – the material on which we will place the dishes, dishes that will not steal the show from dishes, accessories that could interfere with exchanges and conversations … Or even lighting and the music, which will accompany “your staging” to put the table at the center of attention.

“I like to imagine it as a large canvas on which I will place serving dishes overflowing with fragrant and colorful dishes, so many brushstrokes that will make up a beautiful large fresco”, he writes in Tables.

It will only remain, then, to immortalize the whole to remember this long-awaited reunion.

Tablées – The pleasure of meeting

Jean-Francois Plante

Man’s Editions

226 pages

Read the article “A unifying menu, made easy”