Have you have noticed how very fat-filled these recipes are? Jeez. I calculated the points total for the Pintadeaux and, alone, it used up my entire weeks worth of points. And the profiteroles, so highly recommended, yummy looking, are even worse. I might as well just eat a stick of butter and skip the effort. The dessert? The Strawberry Bavarian cream...mmmmm but pure heavy cream. So tonight I put down my foot and said nuts to Cordon Bleu directions. I just winged it.
Skipped the profiteroles. Later. Skipped the Strawberry bavarian cream for now. Ditto. I'll definitely try both of these for the techniques eventually. But tonight I concentrated on the Pintadeaux au chou. And I cheated on that. I skipped all butter. Skipped the Polish sausage. And I skipped the lardons. Used local cabbage and skipped all the prep.
We would see lardons for sale at the Carmes market. Neat to know that one can make them, those yummy, salty bits of fat, but no, I will never use them. And frankly, the pintade that we bought in France--a wonderful dark meat flavor--is not replicable here. The closest thing to it, I believe, is dark chicken meat. So instead of a whole bird, I used boneless, skinless chicken thighs.
I sauted the onions and carrots in their own juices, added the cabbage, bouquet garni, salt and pepper, etc., and let it simmer for an hour.
While that was simmering, I fried four slices of low-fat bacon and mixed the chicken thighs (8 of them) in the bacon grease, and slathered them with garlic, thyme (overlooked the bay leaf), salt and pepper and roasted them, along with some yam chunks for 1/2 hour.
Then I served up the vegies with the roasted chicken breasts alongside. The vegetarian got a sweet cabbage dish which she ate with a slice of the Breadman's latest loaf. The meat eaters got a flavorful dish that was only 6 points. Okay, so it wasn't Cordon Bleu, but it was tasty.