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Do You Really Want To Make Risotto To Order When You Have Eight Guests Sitting There? No. It Won't Work. Most Cookbooks Won't Tell You That. They Will Say Make It And It Will Come Out Perfectly. They Should Tell You You're Probably Going To Screw It Up The First 10 Times You Make It.

-Anthony Bourdain

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Do You Really Want

Anthony Bourdain

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Do You Really Want To Make Risotto To Order When You Have Eight Guests Sitting There? No. It Won't Work. Most Cookbooks Won't Tell You That. They Will Say Make It And It Will Come Out Perfectly. They Should Tell You You're Probably Going To Screw It Up The First 10 Times You Make It.

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Being On Television, Being Recognizable, This Is Unnatural.

We Now Have A Generation Of People Who In Many Cases Feel That If They Become Chefs, They'll Get A Tv Show. They Have A Signature Haircut, A Year Into The Business, Or A Branding Arrangement With A Shoe Company. I Don't Really Relate To That. I Guess This Is The World We Live In Now.

At The End Of The Day, The Tv Show Is The Best Job In The World. I Get To Go Anywhere I Want, Eat And Drink Whatever I Want. As Long As I Just Babble At The Camera, Other People Will Pay For It. It's A Gift.

I Won't Eat In A Restaurant With Filthy Bathrooms. This Isn't A Hard Call. They Let You See The Bathrooms. If The Restaurant Can't Be Bothered To Replace The Puck In The Urinal Or Keep The Toilets And Floors Clean, Then Just Imagine What Their Refrigeration And Work Spaces Look Like.

I Love New York. I'm A Guy For Whom A New York Accent Is A Comforting Thing.

Open Your Mind, Get Up Off The Couch, Move.

Hong Kong Is A Wonderful, Mixed-up Town Where You've Got Great Food And Adventure. First And Foremost, It's A Great Place To Experience China In A Relatively Accessible Way.

When I'm Doing A Book Tour In The States, I'll Wake Up In The Room Sometimes In An Anonymous Chain Hotel, And I Don't Know Where I Am Right Away. I'll Go To The Window, And It Doesn't Help There Either, Especially If You're In An Anonymous Strip And It's The Usual Victoria's Secret, Gap, Chili's, Applebee's.

The Fact That Over 50 Per Cent Of The Residents Of Toronto Are Not From Canada, That Is Always A Good Thing, Creatively, And For Food Especially. That Is Easily A City's Biggest Strength, And It Is Toronto's Unique Strength.

On One Hand We Encourage And Allow Major Pharmaceutical Companies To Openly Hook Vast Sectors Of Our Population On Narcotics, And Then We Cut Them Off And Throw Them In Jail, And Moralize About It. It Is Clearly A Huge, Huge, And Growing Problem. It's Devastating. We Need To Treat It As A Health Crisis, Which It Is, And Stop Moralizing.

Whatever Everyone Else Has Asked You To Do Or Never Let You Do, And Let's Do That.

An Ounce Of Sauce Covers A Multitude Of Sins.

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If People Are Eating Mostly Pickles After Many Generations, Where Did That Come From? It's Reflective Of History, Often A Painful History. It's Central To A Culture, To A History, To A Personal Story. It's Communication At Its Most Fundamental.

If You Have A Good Experience In A Restaurant, You Tell 2 People. If You Have A Bad Experience, You Tell 10 People.

I Don't Snack. I Don't Generally Eat Sweets Or Drink Soda. I Never Eat Between Meals Or Even Before Big Ones.

The Kobe Craze Really Annoyed Me. Most Of The Practitioners Had No Real Understanding Of The Product And Were Abusing It And Exploiting It In Terrible And Ridiculous Ways. Kobe Beef Should Not Be Used In A Hamburger. It's Completely Pointless.

Anything That Improves People's Expectations Of A Meal Is Good For The World. Anything That Weans Even One Kid Or One Adult Away From Chili's Or T.g.i. Friday's Is Definitely A Win For The Good Guys.

I Do The Meatball Recipe A Lot. I Think The Army Stew Probably Too. It's The Most Useful Dish Because It Was Born Out Of Necessity And Poverty And Any Idiot Can Make It In 20 Minutes On A Hot Plate. It's Cheap And Uses Readily Available Commercial Ingredients. And It's Delicious. It Should Be The Great American Dish - Perfect Late-night Stoner Dorm Food For College Kids On A Budget.

I Need The Anesthetic Qualities Of The Local Fire Water.

I'm Definitely Looking Forward To The Day When I Stop Working - If I Ever Stop Working. I Like The Idea Of Keeling Over In My Tomato Vines In Sardinia Or Northern Italy.

I've Long Believed That Good Food, Good Eating, Is All About Risk. Whether We're Talking About Unpasteurized Stilton, Raw Oysters Or Working For Organized Crime 'associates,' Food, For Me, Has Always Been An Adventure

Jiro Ono Serves Edo-style Traditional Sushi, The Same 20 Or 30 Pieces He's Been Making His Whole Life, And He's Still Unsatisfied With The Quality And Every Day Wakes Up And Trains To Make The Best. And That Is As Close To A Religious Experience In Food As One Is Likely To Get.

People Are Generally Proud Of Their Food. A Willingness To Eat And Drink With People Without Fear And Prejudice... They Open Up To You In Ways That Somebody Visiting Who Is Driven By A Story May Not Get.

This Is The Dream Of All The World. The Dream Is To Live In Granada. You Know, Work In The Morning, Have A One-hour In The Afternoon, At Night Go Out And Have That Life. You Know. Go Out And See Your Friends And Eat Tapa And Drink Red Wine And Be In A Beautiful Place.

Nobody In Singapore Drinks Singapore Slings. It's One Of The First Things You Find Out There. What You Do In Singapore Is Eat. It's A Really Food-crazy Culture, Where All Of This Great Food Is Available In A Kind Of Hawker-stand Environment.

I Try To Very Hard To Avoid A Situation Where I Would Be Eating Cat Or Dog; I've Managed To Gracefully Avoid That. It's Hypocritical Of Me And An Arbitrary Line, But One That I Have Managed To Avoid Crossing.

I'm Very Proud Of The Rome Episode Of 'no Reservations' Because It Violated All The Conventional Wisdom About Making Television. You're Never, Ever Supposed To Do A Food Or Travel Show In Black And White.

Black And White

Understand, When You Eat Meat, That Something Did Die. You Have An Obligation To Value It - Not Just The Sirloin But Also All Those Wonderful Tough Little Bits.

Luck Is Not A Business Model.

Business Models

Garlic Is Divine. Few Food Items Can Taste So Many Distinct Ways, Handled Correctly. Misuse Of Garlic Is A Crime...please, Treat Your Garlic With Respect...avoid At All Costs That Vile Spew You See Rotting In Oil In Screwtop Jars. Too Lazy To Peel Fresh? You Don't Deserve To Eat Garlic.

[when I Die], I Will Decidedly Not Be Regretting Missed Opportunities For A Good Time. My Regrets Will Be More Along The Lines Of A Sad List Of People Hurt, People Let Down, Assets Wasted And Advantages Squandered.

I Couldn't Imagine A More Unreliable, More Unprofitable Way To Make A Living Than Writing. My Advice? Show Up, Do The Best You Can. Keep Your Day Job. If You Get A Lucky Break, Don't F*** Up. It Was Helpful To Be Older Because I Had Made All The Really Stupid Mistakes Already.

I Think It's Important If You're Going To Write A Cookbook, It Should Sound Like You Talking - It Should Be Things You Actually Believe, Otherwise I'm Not Interested.

If You've Ever Hauled A 28-pound Two-year-old Around New York, You'll Find That Men Fold At The Knees A Lot Quicker Than Women.

I Think We Should Increase The Minimum Wage And I Think $15 Is A Good Beginning.

I'm At My Most Productive Before I Even Have My First Cup Of Coffee. I Only Get Slower And Stupider As The Day Progresses.

Margarine? That's Not Food. I Can't Believe It's Not Butter? I Can. If You're Planning On Using Margarine In Anything, You Can Stop Reading Now, Because I Won't Be Able To Help You.

Travel Isn’t Always Pretty. It Isn’t Always Comfortable. Sometimes It Hurts, It Even Breaks Your Heart. But That’s Okay. The Journey Changes You; It Should Change You. It Leaves Marks On Your Memory, On Your Consciousness, On Your Heart, And On Your Body. You Take Something With You. Hopefully, You Leave Something Good Behind.

I Did Go Into The Amazonian Region Of Brazil. They Have Prehistoric River Fish That Weigh In At Around 600 Pounds, Which You Don’t See Anywhere Else. And Foods That Cannot Be Exported Or Even Found In Other Parts Of Brazil.

Never Try To Get Your Kid To Eat Anything She Doesn't Already Want To Eat. Just Eat Interesting Stuff In Front Of Her While Completely Ignoring Her. Never, Ever Suggest "try It." Never Say Those Dreaded Words "try It, It's Good." Or Worse, "it's Good For You." That'll Poison The Well.

The Notion That Before You Even Set Out To Go To Thailand, You Say, 'i'm Not Interested,' Or You're Unwilling To Try Things That People Take So Personally And Are So Proud Of And So Generous With, I Don't Understand That, And I Think It's Rude. You're At Grandma's House, You Eat What Grandma Serves You.

I'm A Control Freak. If You're Going To Slap My Name On Something, I Would Like To Control It.

Naturally, I'm Misanthropic. But The Negronis Are Helping Considerably.

The Italians And Spanish, The Chinese And Vietnamese See Food As Part Of A Larger, More Essential And Pleasurable Part Of Daily Life. Not As An Experience To Be Collected Or Bragged About - Or As A Ritual Like Filling Up A Car - But As Something Else That Gives Pleasure, Like Sex Or Music, Or A Good Nap In The Afternoon.

I'm Certainly Dismayed By What I'm Seeing Now. There's A Lot Of Ugliness Of A Kind I've Never Seen In My Lifetime, Or Heard In My Lifetime. But, Look, I'm A Romantic. I'm Hopeful.

In That Sense, What A Great Way To Live, If You Could Always Do Things That Interest You, And Do Them With People Who Interest You.

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Italy Is Good In The Sense That When You Bring A Child To A Restaurant In Italy, They're Happy To See It. The Waiters Will Say "complimenti" And Welcome You And Dote After The Kid. They Don't Treat You Like You Just Brought In This Horrible Probably Soon-to-be-squealing Creature Who's Going To Be Difficult.

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The Way You Make An Omelet Reveals Your Character.

No One Understands And Appreciates The American Dream Of Hard Work Leading To Material Rewards Better Than A Non-american.

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Theres No Hope, None, Of Ever Talking About It Without Pissing Somebody, If Not Everybody, Off...by The End Of This Hour I Will Be Seen By Many As A Terrorist Sympathizer, A Zionist Tool. A Self-hating Jew, An Apologist For American Imperialism, An Orientalist, Socialist, Fascist, Cia Agent, And Worse.

I Do Not Have A Merchandise Line. I Don't Sell Knives Or Apparel. Though I Have Been Approached To Endorse Various Products From Liquor To Airlines To Automobiles To Pharmaceuticals Dozens Of Times, I Have Managed To Resist The Temptation.

When Your Signature Dish Is Hamburger In Between A Doughnut, And You've Been Cheerfully Selling This Stuff Knowing All Along That You've Got Type 2 Diabetes... It's In Bad Taste If Nothing Else.

Type 2 Diabetes

Drink Heavily With Locals Whenever Possible.

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I Would Like To See People More Aware Of Where Their Food Comes From. I Would Like To See Small Farmers Empowered. I Feed My Daughter Almost Exclusively Organic Food.

If I Were Trapped In One City And Had To Eat One Nation's Cuisine For The Rest Of My Life, I Would Not Mind Eating Japanese. I Adore Japanese Food. I Love It.

On The Plane, I Like To Read Fiction Set In The Location I'm Going To. Fiction Is In Many Ways More Useful Than A Guidebook, Because It Gives You Those Little Details, A Sense Of The Way A Place Smells, An Emotional Sense Of The Place. So, I'll Bring Graham Greene's The Quiet American If I'm Going To Vietnam. It's Good To Feel Romantic About A Destination Before You Arrive.

I'd Learned Something... Food Had Power. It Could Inspire, Astonish, Shock, Excite, Delight And Impress. It Had The Power To Please Me... And Others. This Was Valuable Information.

In College, I Think I Probably Positioned Myself As An Aspiring Writer, Meaning I Dressed Sort Of Extravagantly And Adopted All The Semi-byronic Affectations, As If I Were Writing, Although I Wasn't Actually Doing Any Writing.

Regret Is Something You’ve Got To Just Live With, You Can’t Drink It Away. You Can’t Run Away From It. You Can’t Trick Yourself Out Of It. You’ve Just Got To Own It.

I Could Do Nothing But Brooklyn Shows For The Rest Of My Career, And I Could Die Ignorant.

Without Montreal, Canada Would Be Hopeless.

People Everywhere Have Been Very, Very Good To Me, Whether I'm With Or Without Cameras.

All Of These Concoctions That We Think Are Mexican, Are In No Way Reflective Of The Deep, Incredibly Old, Complex And Sophisticated Deep Regional Cuisine Of Mexico. Or The New Modern Mexican Cuisine, Which Has Really Been Exploding Over The Last Few Years. I Think We Just Have A Completely Misrepresented View Of How Good, How Complex These Flavors Are. I Think We Could Learn A Lot More. It's A Great Cuisine That's Really Moving Forward, Faster Than Any Other.

I'm Not Searching For Hard News; I'm Not A Journalist, But I'm Interested In Pushing To Boundaries Of Where We Can Do The Kind Of Stories That We Want To Do. I Mean, It's A Big World And Cnn Has Made It A Lot Bigger And They Haven't Flinched.

If You Get An Opportunity To Work With David Simon, Anybody With Good Taste Would.

I Learned A Long Time Ago That Trying To Micromanage The Perfect Vacation Is Always A Disaster. That Leads To Terrible Times.

If You’re Twenty-two, Physically Fit, Hungry To Learn And Be Better, I Urge You To Travel – As Far And As Widely As Possible. Sleep On Floors If You Have To. Find Out How Other People Live And Eat And Cook. Learn From Them – Wherever You Go.

As Americans, We Tend To Look At Mexican Food As Nachos, Which Is Not Mexican Food Really - They Don't Eat Them.

In This Way, Writers Are Indeed, As Henry Miller Suggested, Traitors To The Human Race. We May Turn A Light On Inequity, Injustice, And Oppression From Time To Time, But We Regularly Kill What We Love In Insidious Fashion.

Learn How To Cook A (effing) Omelet. I Mean, What Nicer Thing Can You Do For Somebody Than Make Them Breakfast? You Look Good Doing It, And It's A Nice Thing To Do For Somebody You Just Had Sex With.

Italy Is Hard To Beat. It's A Family-friendly Experience, They Like To See Kids In Restaurants, And At Dinner You See All The Adults At The Table And All The Kids At The Other End Of The Table. Maybe They Run Off And Go Play.

The Cooking Profession, While It's A Noble Craft And A Noble Calling, 'cause You're Doing Something Useful - You're Feeding People, You're Nurturing Them, You're Providing Sustenance - It Was Never Pure.

I Hated The Naked Chef. Fine, Yes, He Did Good Things For School Food Or Whatever, But, You Know, I Don't Want My Chefs To Be Cute And Adorable.

These Pharmaceutical Company Executives Are Dope Dealers And They Should Be Treated Worse, And More Roughly Than Dope Dealers. When You're Talking About Millionaire And Billionaire Executives At Pharmaceutical Companies, These Are People With Something To Lose If Threatened With Jail. Frog-march Them Out Of Their Door In Suburbia, Handcuffed And Surrounded By Dea Officers, With Their Children And Neighbours Watching.

I Do My Very Best To Avoid Shark Fin.

Big Stuff And Little: Learning How To Order Breakfast In A Country Where I Don't Speak The Language And Haven't Been Before - That's Really Satisfying To Me. I Like That.

You Dropped A 500-seat Deuce On Times Square.

Let's At Least Acknowledge Who Is Working In America Right Now And What Our Needs Are, As Well As The Moral Question Of Somebody Who's Been Here 20 Years, Paying Taxes To Which They Probably Do Not Receive A Refund, And Not Committing Any Crimes, Working Hard, And Supporting An Industry. Shouldn't There Be Some Middle Ground Here? Shouldn't There Be A Way For Them To Be Welcome In This Country?

There Are Very Sophisticated, Very Time-consuming Dishes To Prepare; Always From Scratch, And Always In Excess Of What You Could Possibly Need. You Tend To Kill Your Guests With Kindness Around Here.

I'm Not Looking To Freak People Out - Eating Rodents Or Bugs. I Don't Do That Anymore.

When I'm Back In New York - And This Is A Terrible Thing To Complain About - I Eat A Lot More Really, Really Good Food Than Perhaps I'd Like To. So Many Of My Friends Are Really Good Chefs. It's Kind Of Like Being In The Mafia.

Good Food Does Lead To Sex. As It Should. And In A Perfect World, Good Music Does Too.

It's That Show Friends. Ruined Coffee Forever.

I Wanted To Write In Kitchenese, The Secret Language Of Cooks, Instantly Recognizable To Anyone Who Has Ever Dunked French Fries For A Summer Job Or Suffered Under The Despotic Rule Of A Tyrannical Chef Or Boobish Owner.

Chefs Are Fond Of Hyperbole, So They Can Certainly Talk That Way. But On The Whole, I Think They Probably Have A More Open Mind Than Most People.

Don't Touch My D**k, Don't Touch My Knife.

The Roots Of Creativity Of Cooking Are Hungry People Trying To Figure Out How To Take Something That's Not Particularly Fresh Or Tender And Transform It Into It Something Delicious That Everyone Will Love.

I Travel 250 Days A Year. There Are Chef Friends Who I Only See Every Couple Of Years. By Conventional Standards I'm A Bad Friend. I'm Not There To Remember Your Birthday Or To Offer You Words Of Support Through Twitter. I'm Not Up On What You're Doing In New York Because I'm Not In New York. I'm Not What People Call In Parenting Circles "present."

I Don't Like To See Animals In Pain. That Was Very Uncomfortable To Me. I Don't Like Factory Farming. I'm Not An Advocate For The Meat Industry.

We Learn As Professionals By Repetition, By Getting It Wrong, Getting Yelled At And Doing It Again.

I’m Always Secretly The Most Pleased When A Show Just Really, Really Looks Good And When My Camera Guys Are Really Happy With The Images They Got.

I Wish I Could Play Bass Like Larry Graham Or Bootsy Collins. My God, I'd Give Up Just About Everything Else For That.

When Dealing With Complex Transportation Issues, The Best Thing To Do Is Pull Up With A Cold Beer And Let Somebody Else Figure It Out.

You Have To Love A Town Where You Can Both Smoke And Gamble In A Pharmacy.

I Don't Have Much Patience For People Who Are Self-conscious About The Act Of Eating, And It Irritates Me When Someone Denies Themselves The Pleasure Of A Bloody Hunk Of Steak Or A Pungent French Cheese Because Of Some Outdated Nonsense About What's Appropriate Or Attractive.

Your Body Is Not A Temple, It's An Amusement Park. Enjoy The Ride.

The Cookbooks I Value The Most In My Collection Are The Ones Where You Hear The Author's Voice And Point-of-view In Every Recipe.

Wholesome Food Is Wholesome Food Anywhere. I May Not Like Something But, Generally Speaking, If It's A Busy, Street Food Stall Serving Mystery Meat In India, They're In The Business Of Serving Their Neighbors. They're Not Targeted Toward A Transient Crowd Of Tourists That Won't Be Around Tomorrow. They're Not In The Business Of Poisoning Their Neighbors.

Writing Anything Is A Treason Of Sorts.

I’m A Big Believer In Winging It. I’m A Big Believer That You’re Never Going To Find Perfect City Travel Experience Or The Perfect Meal Without A Constant Willingness To Experience A Bad One. Letting The Happy Accident Happen Is What A Lot Of Vacation Itineraries Miss, I Think, And I’m Always Trying To Push People To Allow Those Things To Happen Rather Than Stick To Some Rigid Itinerary.

When I Was Writing 'kitchen Confidential,' I Was In My 40s, I Had Never Paid Rent On Time, I Was 10 Years Behind On My Taxes, I Had Never Owned My Own Furniture Or A Car.

Food Is Everything We Are. It's An Extension Of Nationalist Feeling, Ethnic Feeling, Your Personal History, Your Province, Your Region, Your Tribe, Your Grandma. It's Inseparable From Those From The Get-go.

Sometimes The Greatest Meals On Vacations Are The Ones You Find When Plan A Falls Through.

I Think There's A Great Storytelling Tradition In The Restaurant Business That Tends To Attract People With An Oral Tradition Of Bulls - Ting And Bollocking. Creative People, People For Whom The 9-to-5 World Is Not Attractive Or Impossible. It Seems That Way. There Are A Lot Of Stories In The Business, And A Lot Of Characters - And It Seems To Attract Its Share Of Artists And Writers And People Who Hope To Do Something Creative In Their Lives.

You'd Have A Hard Time Finding Anything Better Than Barcelona For Food, As Far As Being A Hub. Given A Choice Between Barcelona And San Sebastian To Die In, I'd Probably Want To Die In San Sebastian.

Most Of The Time, I'm Fighting Guys Who Are 22 Years Old, Former College Wrestlers, Athletes, Kids Who Are In Much Better Shape Than Me. Often People Who Are Much Bigger And Wider Than Me. It Can Be Dispiriting At First.

When Do You Stop To De-douche?

I've Been Cooking For A Nine-year-old And Her Friends For The Better Part Of Seven Or Eight Years. It's How I Cook Today, It's What Makes Me Happy. I Tend To Overcompensate For My Long Absences When I'm Home By Cooking And It's Therapeutic To Me - It's How I Express Love For My Daughter. It Felt Good To Do.

Just Because We Are Not Italian, Does Not Mean We Cannot Appreciate Michelangelo, It Is The Same With Cuisine.

I Lurched Away From The Table After A Few Hours Feeling Like Elvis In Vegas - Fat, Drugged, And Completely Out Of It.

One Of The Things Is Challenging Yourself To Do A Rome Show When Everybody's Done A Rome Show. To Find Some Aspect Of Food Culture Or Chef Culture That People Can Look At In A New Way.

You Realize After You Travel Enough That There's Some Things That, No Matter How Good You Are At Making Television, No Matter How Good Your Cameras Are, How Well It's Edited, There's No Way The Lenses Could Have Captured The Moment, And There's No Way You Will Ever Be Able To Write About It And Do It Justice.

One Of Life's Terrible Truths Is That Women Like Guys Who Seem To Know What They're Doing.

Drugs Didn't Work Out Too Well For Me.

As I See It, Fast Food Outfits Have Targeted Small Children With Their Advertising In A Very Effective Way. You Know, It's Clowns And Kid's Toys And Bright Colors And Things Like That.

I Eat Strategically. If I Know I'm Having A Big Chinese Banquet Tomorrow, I'm Not Eating A Big Dinner Tonight, And I'm Not Having Breakfast.

I Am In No Way Supportive Of Hunting For Trophies Or Sport - Would Never Do It And Don't Like It That Others Do. But If You Kill It, Then Eat It, It's Fine.

Peta Doesn't Want Stressed Animals To Be Cruelly Crowded Into Sheds, Ankle-deep In Their Own Crap, Because They Don't Want Any Animals To Die Ever And Basically Think Chickens Should, In Time, Gain The Right To Vote. I Don't Want Animals Stressed Or Crowded Or Treated Cruelly Or Inhumanely Because That Makes Them Probably Less Delicious.

New Orleans Is A Glorious Mutation

I Think We Should Be Honest About Who Is Working In Our Kitchens.

It's Not Normal, What I Do. Just Being On Television Isn't.

Cooking Breakfast And Brunch Professionally Really Kind Of Ruined Breakfast Service For Me For A Long Time.

There's Something Wonderful About Drinking In The Afternoon. A Not-too-cold Pint, Absolutely Alone At The Bar - Even In This Fake-ass Irish Pub.

The Fact Of The Matter Is That, For Years, The Restaurant And Service Industry Has Been, To A Great Extent, Built On The Backs Of Often Underpaid Immigrants Of Often Dubious Legal Status.

I Didn't Want Food That Looked Unapproachable Or Ridiculously Beautiful.

What Is Left Of The Poor? Try To Buy A Fresh F**king Vegetable In West Baltimore. It Is A Not Completely Inconceivable Scenario In The Future, We'll All Look Like That... Waddling From Convenience Store To Fast Food Outlet, Chewing Mindlessly On 99 Cent Hamburgers.

I Managed To Reach A Depth Of Self-loathing That Usually Takes A Night Of Drinking To Achieve.

I'm Away 250 Days A Year. It's A Tough Situation.

Tough Situations

Every Chef I Know, Their Cholesterol Is Through The Roof. And Mine's Not So Great.

It Would Be An Egregious Mistake To Ever Refer To Me In The Same Breath As Most Of The People I Write About.

A Good, Stinky French Cheese Or A Good Stilton. These Are Things I Really, Really Love. Dessert I Can Obviously Live Without.

Do You Really Want To Make Risotto To Order When You Have Eight Guests Sitting There? No. It Won't Work. Most Cookbooks Won't Tell You That. They Will Say Make It And It Will Come Out Perfectly. They Should Tell You You're Probably Going To Screw It Up The First 10 Times You Make It.

I Am Not A Fan Of People Who Abuse Service Staff. In Fact, I Find It Intolerable. It’s An Unpardonable Sin As Far As I’m Concerned, Taking Out Personal Business Or Some Other Kind Of Dissatisfaction On A Waiter Or Busboy.

To Me, Life Without Veal Stock, Pork Fat, Sausage, Organ Meat, Demi-glace, Or Even Stinky Cheese Is A Life Not Worth Living. Vegetarians Are The Enemy Of Everything Good And Decent In The Human Spirit, An Affront To All I Stand For, The Pure Enjoyment Of Food.

I'm Not Afraid To Look Like An Idiot On Tv.

I've Seen Zero Evidence Of Any Nation On Earth Other Than Mexico Even Remotely Having The Slightest Clue What Mexican Food Is About Or Even Come Close To Reproducing It. It Is Perhaps The Most Misunderstood Country And Cuisine On Earth.

It's As If Japanese Men, All To Aware That Deep Inside They'd Like To Stomp Tokyo Flat, Breathe Fire, And Do Truly Terrible And Disgusting Things To Women, Have Built Themselves The Most Beautiful Of Prisons For Their Rampaging Ids. Instead Of Indulging Their Fantasies, They Focus On Food, Or Landscaping, Or The Perfect Cup Of Tea -- Or A Single Slab Of O-toro Tuna -- Letting Themselves Go Only At Baseball Games And Office Parties.

In Fairness, You Know, I'm A Big Believer In If Your Kid Makes Noise In The Restaurant You Should Remove The Child Immediately.

For A Moment, Or A Second, The Pinched Expressions Of The Cynical, World-weary, Throat-cutting, Miserable Bastards We've All Had To Become Disappears, When We're Confronted With Something As Simple As A Plate Of Food.

In My House, Neither My Wife Nor My Daughter Are Impressed That I'm On Television, And They Remind Me Of That Frequently.

Really Annoys Me Any Time I See Asian Fusion Too. Asia Is A Big Place; Which Asian Are You Talking About? You Notice It's Never Uzbek Or Tajik Food. It's Thai, And It's Generally Insulting.

A Burger Is Something Anyone Can Do, Just Follow The Rules.

I’m A Twitter Addict. Jose Andres Is A Serial Tweeter. It’s Funny To See Which Chefs Have Embraced It, And The Different Paths They Take.

Being A Vegan Is A First-world Phenomenon, Completely Self-indulgent.

There Are People With Otherwise Chaotic And Disorganized Lives, A Certain Type Of Person That's Always Found A Home In The Restaurant Business In Much The Same Way That A Lot Of People Find A Home In The Military.

One Of My Few Virtues - I Don't Have A Lot Of Them - Would Be A Deep Sense Of Curiosity. I'm Interested In How Other People Live In Other Places; I'm Interested In Other Cultures.

Without New Ideas Success Can Become Stale

Cream Rises. Excellence Does Have Its Rewards.

I'm Really Good At Sleeping On Planes. I Mean, I Smell Jet Fuel And I'm Out; I'm Asleep For Takeoff.

The Ingredients Of A Hamburger Seldom Vary. It's A Percentage Of Fat To Lean Meat, Add Salt And Prepare And That's It. It Shouldn't Need A Recipe.

As A Chef I’m Not Your Dietitian Or Your Ethicist, I’m In The Pleasure Business.

I'm Really Happy To See The Explosion Of Interest In Korean Food, And This Hybrid Korean-american Food.

What You're Going To Be Eating In The Next Year Is Decided By Chefs. If The Consensus Is That Pot-bellies Are In Next Season, That's What's On Your Plate. And I Think That's A Good Thing, Because We Know, Obviously, About Food.

My Tastes In What I Eat At Home Would Be Very Familiar To Most People Who Cook For Families. I Just Organize Those Things A Little Bit Differently.

What Nicer Thing Can You Do For Somebody Than Make Them Breakfast?

Breakfast Being Important

My House Is Run, Essentially, By An Adopted, Fully Clawed Cat With A Mean Nature.

You Have To Be A Romantic To Invest Yourself, Your Money, And Your Time In Cheese.

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If You Go To Working Class, And Working Poor Areas Of America, The Food Sources That Are Relegated To Them Are Generally Limited To Unhealthy Ones.

I Guess My Whole Life, As Much As I Might Have Wanted A Child For The Reason That Everybody Wants One, I Always Recognized That At No Point Until I Was 50 Was I Old Enough Or Up To The Job. I Thought, You Know What, I Not Only Really Want A Child, But At This Point, Finally In My Life, I Think I'm Up To The Job And I'm The Type Of Person Who Could Do The Job Well And I'm Financially Prepared To Look After A Child.

Is It A Good Hot Dog? That’s All I Want To Know … I Don’t Think The Personal Health And Purity Of My Colon Is That Important Compared To Pleasure. As A Chef, I’m Not Your Dietitian Or Your Ethicist. I’m In The Pleasure Business …. My Responsibility Is To Give You The Most Delicious Tomato That I Can Afford, Given The Circumstances, And Maybe Increase The Likelihood That You Get Laid After Dinner.

Vegetarians, And Their Hezbollah-like Splinter Faction, The Vegans ... Are The Enemy Of Everything Good And Decent In The Human Spirit.

I Could Eat Bloody Elvis - If You Put Enough Vinegar On Him.

I Believe - To The Best Of My Recollection, Anyway - That I Soon Made The Classic Error Of Moving From Margaritas To Actual Shots Of Straight Tequila. It Does Make It Easier To Meet New People.

I Feel That If Jacques Pepin Shows You How To Make An Omelet, The Matter Is Pretty Much Settled. That's God Talking.

I Like Telling Stories, And I Tell Stories That Interest Me. It Would Be Boring To Have To Go To Nothing But The Best Restaurants. That Would Be A Misery To Me.

I'd Like To Play Bass Like Bootsy Collins. I'm Serious. That Would Be My Dream.

Venezuela Is Another Place I'd Like Very Much To Go, Which Is Proving Very Difficult. I Have Not Been There To Make A Show And I'd Like To, Very Much.

I Write Quickly With A Sense Of Urgency. I Don't Edit Myself Out Of Existence, Meaning I'll Try To Write 50 Or 60 Pages Before I Start Rereading, Revising And Editing. That Just Helps With My Confidence.

That Without Experimentation, A Willingness To Ask Questions And Try New Things, We Shall Surely Become Static, Repetitive, Moribund.

Norman Mailer Described The Desire To Be Cool As A "decision To Encourage The Psychopath In Oneself, To Explore That Domain Of Experience Where Security Is Boredom And Therefore Sickness And One Exists In The Present, In That Enormous Present Which Is Without Past Or Future, Memory Or Planned Intention.

The World They Live In Now Is In No Way The World The Michelin System Was Set Up To Evaluate Back In France, Which Was All About Motorists And Seeing If It Was Worth Driving An Extra 50 Miles For A Restaurant. It's A Silly Thing. Why Do You Want To Help A Tire Company? You Don't Owe Them Nothing.

In Italy, Kids Are Taken To Restaurants Very Early, They're Welcome There, And They Learn How To Behave. You Don't See A Lot Of Screaming Crying Kids Acting Out In A Restaurant In Italy. They Don't Put Up With That.

Thinking That Your Story Is So Interesting That Other People Will Want To Listen To It Or Read It Or Pay To Hear It, That's - What Kind Of Person Thinks That? A Monster Of Self-regard. It's Not Normal Thinking.

Meals Make The Society, Hold The Fabric Together In Lots Of Ways That Were Charming And Interesting And Intoxicating To Me. The Perfect Meal, Or The Best Meals, Occur In A Context That Frequently Has Very Little To Do With The Food Itself.

To The Extent I Am Known, I Think I Am Known As A Person Who Expresses His Opinion Freely About Things - And I Was Sensitive To The Possibility That If I Was Seen Taking Money For Saying Nice Things About A Product, My Comments And Choices And Opinions Would Become, Understandably, Suspect.

We Know, For Instance, That There Is A Direct, Inverse Relationship Between Frequency Of Family Meals And Social Problems. Bluntly Stated, Members Of Families Who Eat Together Regularly Are Statistically Less Likely To Stick Up Liquor Stores, Blow Up Meth Labs, Give Birth To Crack Babies, Commit Suicide, Or Make Donkey Porn. If Little Timmy Had Just Had More Meatloaf, He Might Not Have Grown Up To Fill Chest Freezers With Cub Scout Parts.

Assume The Worst. About Everybody. But Don't Let This Poisoned Outlook Affect Your Job Performance. Let It All Roll Off Your Back. Ignore It. Be Amused By What You See And Suspect. Just Because Someone You Work With Is A Miserable, Treacherous, Self-serving, Capricious And Corrupt Asshole Shouldn't Prevent You From Enjoying Their Company, Working With Them Or Finding Them Entertaining.

I Wasn't That Great A Chef, And I Don't Think I'm That Great A Writer.

If I'm An Advocate For Anything, It's To Move. As Far As You Can, As Much As You Can. Across The Ocean, Or Simply Across The River. The Extent To Which You Can Walk In Someone Else's Shoes Or At Least Eat Their Food, It's A Plus For Everybody. Open Your Mind, Get Up Off The Couch, Move.

I Urge You To Travel - As Far And As Widely As Possible. Sleep On Floors If You Have To.

Kitchen Confidential

It's Wrong I Think, Morally And Annoying In General, To Try To Get A Kid To Be A Foodie, So I Never Even Suggested, "hey Baby It's Good, Maybe You Should Try It." That Never Worked For Me.

I Just Do The Best I Can And Write Something Interesting, To Tell Stories In An Interesting Way And Move Forward From There.

Where Once They Used To Say, 'cocaine Is God's Way Of Saying You Have Too Much Money' - Now, Maybe Edm Is. Come Ye Lords And Princelings Of Douchedom.

Thinking Of Getting Into The Leg-breaking Business, So I Can Profitably Sell Crutches Later.

I'm Of A Generation That Romanticizes And Maybe Even Over-romanticized Things That Were Painful, That Hurt Others. I Feel That. But I Don't Know If I Have Any Regrets.

Cooking Is Work That Is Traditionally Done By Working-class People. The Work Itself Is Not Glamorous. It's Repetitive, And It's A Lot Closer To Factory Work Than Art, Whatever Level You're Doing It At. Certainly Chefs Are Used To Living Like Rock 'n' Rollers To Some Extent, Inasmuch As We Get A Lot Of Those Fringe Benefits Without Having To Learn How To Play Guitar.

I, A Product Of The New Frontier And Great Society, Honestly Believed That The World Pretty Much Owed Me A Living--all I Had To Do Was Wait Around In Order To Live Better Than My Parents.

The Biggest Empty Space, The Biggest Gap In What Should Be A Premier And Always Vibrant Food Scene In America Is That We Don't Have Hawker Centers Like They Do In Singapore, Basically Food Courts Where Mom And Pop Specialists Can Set Up Shop In Fairly Hygienic Little Stalls All Up To Health Code Making One Dish They've Been Doing Forever And Ever.

You Know, From Age 17 On, My Paycheck Was Coming From Cooking And Working In Kitchens.

I'd Never Done Anything Useful As Far As My Writing.

The Worst, Most Dangerous Person To America Is Clearly Paula Deen. She Revels In Unholy Connections With Evil Corporations And She's Proud Of The Fact That Her Food Is F---ing Bad For You. If I Were On At Seven At Night And Loved By Millions Of People At Every Age, I Would Think Twice Before Telling An Already Obese Nation That It's Ok To Eat Food That Is Killing Us. Plus, Her Food Sucks.

It's Very Rarely A Good Career Move To Have A Conscience.

Look, Getting Bullied In School And Coming Home Crying In The Rain And My Mom Making Me A Can Of Campbell's Tomato Soup With Some Oysterettes. It Was Comfort Food; That Is What Food Should Be.

I Often Look Ridiculous In Japan. There's Really No Way To Eat In Japan, Particularly Kaiseki In A Traditional Ryokan, Without Offending The Japanese Horribly. Every Gesture, Every Movement Is Just So Atrociously Wrong, And The More I Try, The More Hilarious It Is.

There Is No Final Resting Place Of The Mind.

Kitchen Confidential

I'm Not Trying To Explain Other Cultures, Or To Give A Fair And Balanced Account Of A Country, Or The Top Ten Things You Need To Know. I'm Not Trying To Spread World Peace And Understanding. I'm Not An Advocate Or An Activist Or An Educator Or A Journalist. I'm Out There Trying To Tell Stories The Best I Can.

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