When the book “French Women Don’t GetFat” arrived on the scene at the end of 2004, I was intrigued by the premise: “Don’t diet. Eat chocolate. Drink wine. Take long walks. Enjoy life. Stay slim the French way.”
Many diet and cookbooks these days are trumpeting the “eat what tastes good, but in moderation” — just like “French Women Don’t Get Fat.” This looked like a diet I could get used to. So when the softcover was released recently, I decided to check it out, try some recipes and have that glass of wine. Or two. I’m French Canadian, so this diet had to work for me.
The premise of the book, written by Mireille Guiliano, is that if we choose to eat for pleasure and use some well-known stay-slim French tricks, we too can enjoy our food without worrying about gaining weight.
Guiliano admits she has no physician or nutritionist degree, but that she has observed the French for a lifetime and “French women do as I do: They eat as they like and don’t get fat. Pourquoi?”
So one night, my better half and I tried the Chicken Au Champagne and paired it with the recipe for tomato salad with goat cheese; the two recipes share a few ingredients, and I felt they would complement one another. I was right.
Both the salad and the chicken turned out delicious — all melding the rich flavors Guiliano talks about in her book. (Though, I’d recommend lining the pan with foil when you cook the chicken, as the champagne left scrub-inducing residue.) And, of course, enjoying that with a few glasses of merlot was the perfect last touch.
At the heart of Guiliano’s book, she iterates that any woman can enjoy decadent dishes and stay trim, because the secret is in the mind: “French women don’t get fat because they have not allowed new attitudes and modern theories of how the body uses food to overrulecenturies of experience,” she writes in her book. “They do, however, understand that each of us is the keeper of her own balance, and when the balance slips, each must devise her own plan of correction.”
Tomato salad with goat cheese
Main ingredients
Mesclun or any mixed salad
4 large tomatoes sliced
Goat cheese
Salt and ground pepper
Salad dressing:
2 tablespoons minced shallots
1 teaspoon mustard
2 tablespoons vinegar
6 tablespoons olive oil
Cover each plate with a layer of mesclun or mixed greens. Place sliced tomatoes on top. Salt generously.
Mix the dressing ingredients into an emulsion. Crumble the goat cheese onto the tomato slices.
Season with salt and pepper to taste, pour the dressing on top. Add the chopped parsley. Serve with a slice of country bread.
– “French Women Don’t Get Fat”
