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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.

-Anthony Bourdain

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I Do The Meatball

Anthony Bourdain

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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.

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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.

I Do My Very Best To Avoid Shark Fin.

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.

I Don't Think People Should Be Encouraged To Look Like Kate Moss; I Think That's Unreasonable. I Think The Normal Human Body Should Be Glorified. By The Same Token, If You Need A Stick To Wash Yourself, You're Not Healthy.

The Italians Seem To Have A Better Attitude With Kids And The Food Is Great!

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.

Without Montreal, Canada Would Be Hopeless.

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

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.

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

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.

Don't Lie About It. You Made A Mistake. Admit It And Move On. Just Don't Do It Again. Ever

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.

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.

Do We Really Want To Travel In Hermetically Sealed Popemobiles Through The Rural Provinces Of France, Mexico And The Far East, Eating Only In Hard Rock Cafes And Mcdonalds? Or Do We Want To Eat Without Fear, Tearing Into The Local Stew, The Humble Taqueria's Mystery Meat, The Sincerely Offered Gift Of A Lightly Grilled Fish Head? I Know What I Want. I Want It All. I Want To Try Everything Once.

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.

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.

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.

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

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.

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

Only Desperation Can Account For What The Chinese Do In The Name Of 'medicine.' That's Something You Might Remind Your New Age Friends Who've Gone Gaga Over 'holistic Medicine' And 'alternative Chinese Cures.

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

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You Have An Impeccable Argument If You Said That Singapore, Hong Kong, And Tokyo Are Food Capitals. They Have A Maximum Amount Of Great Stuff To Eat In The Smallest Areas.

Turning Your Nose Up At A Genuine And Sincere Gesture Of Hospitality Is No Way To Travel Or To Make Friends Around The World.

I'm A Decent Cook; I'm A Decent Chef. None Of My Friends Would Ever Have Hired Me At Any Point In My Career. Period.

But I Do Think The Idea That Basic Cooking Skills Are A Virtue, That The Ability To Feed Yourself And A Few Others With Proficiency Should Be Taught To Every Young Man And Woman As A Fundamental Skill, Should Become As Vital To Growing Up As Learning To Wipe One’s Own Ass, Cross The Street By Oneself, Or Be Trusted With Money.

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.

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

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.

The Journey Is Part Of The Experience - An Expression Of The Seriousness Of One's Intent. One Doesn't Take The A Train To Mecca.

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.

My Daughter Takes Pride In Showing Up With Stuff That Other Kids Envy Or Are Freaked Out By, So I Send Her To School With Grilled Octopus.

When Do You Stop To De-douche?

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.

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 Was A Journeyman Chef Of Middling Abilities. Whatever Authority I Have As A Commenter On This World Comes From The Sheer Weight Of 28 Years In The Business. I Kicked Around For 28 Years And Came Out The Other End Alive And Able To Form A Sentence.

To Me, Life Without Veal Stock, Pork Fat, Sausage, Organ Meat, Demi-glace, Or Even Stinky Cheese Is A Life Not Worth Living.

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.

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

I Would Frankly Be Shocked If Donald Trump Even Knows How To Use Chopsticks Or Is Even Able To Manipulate Them With Those Tiny Little Fingers.

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.

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.

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

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

Good Food Is Very Often, Even Most Often, Simple Food.

I Admire Vegetarians Who Refuse To Eat Nothing But Vegetables In Their Homes, But I Also Admire Those Who Put Aside Those Principles Or Those Preferences When They Travel. Just To Be A Good Guest.

I'm Really Happy To See Filipino Cuisine Starting To Really Take Hold Outside Of The Pinoy Community.

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

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.

It’s An Irritating Reality That Many Places And Events Defy Description. Angkor Wat And Machu Picchu, For Instance, Seem To Demand Silence, Like A Love Affair You Can Never Talk About. For A While After, You Fumble For Words, Trying Vainly To Assemble A Private Narrative, An Explanation, A Comfortable Way To Frame Where You’ve Been And Whats Happened. In The End, You’re Just Happy You Were There - With Your Eyes Open - And Lived To See It.

I'm A Comic Nerd. I'm A Former Serious Collector For Much Of My Childhood And Early Teen Years I Wanted To Draw Underground Comics.

I Think Fine Dining Is Dying Out Everywhere... But I Think There Will Be - And There Has To Always Be - Room For At Least A Small Number Of Really Fine, Old-school Fine-dining Restaurants.

I Think Of [street Food] As The Antidote To Fast Food; It's The Clear Alternative To The King, The Clown And The Colonel.

My Wife Was Easy Because She Trains [jiu-jitsu] All The Time. She's Pretty Much On A Completely Different Diet. I Always Just Threw Meat At Her And She's Happy On A 100 Percent Protein Diet, So We Seldom Ate Together.

I'm A Guy Who Should Not Have A Lot Of Free Time. But When It Comes To Vacation, I Like To Pull The Plug Completely. It's All About My Daughter - I'm No Longer The Star Of My Own Movie.

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

Skills Can Be Taught. Character You Either Have Or You Don't Have.

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.

I Like The Fact That Melbourne Always Seems To Support Their Chefs And Promote Them In Ways I Find Really Admirable.

If People Are Working Only Rice And Beans For Much Of Their Diet, It Says Something.

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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.

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

I Think As A Moral Question, Restaurant Workers Should Get Paid More.

Context And Memory Play Powerful Roles In All The Truly Great Meals In One's Life.

The Older I Get, And The More I Travel In Particular, The Less I Care About What Exactly Is In The Dish Than Who's Cooking It And Why.

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.

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

Everything Important I Learned, I Learned As A Dishwasher.

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.

It's Been About A Week Without Alcohol Of Any Kind. I'm Enjoying My New, Clean-living Lifestyle.

Silly Trends Don't Last Long. A Lot Of This Nonsense That Pops Up, I Don't Even Really Pay Attention Because It'll Be Gone In A Flash.

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

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.

'kitchen Confidential' Wasn't A Cautionary Or An Expose. I Wrote It As An Entertainment For New York Tri-state Area Line Cooks And Restaurant Lifers, Basically; I Had No Expectation That It Would Move As Far West As Philadelphia.

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.

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.

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

New Orleans Is A Glorious Mutation

I Listen A Lot To How People Speak. I've Read A Great Many Good Books In My Life. I Had Some Excellent English Teachers. Surely, Those Things Were Helpful.

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

It Seems That The More Places I See And Experience, The Bigger I Realize The World To Be. The More I Become Aware Of, The More I Realize How Relatively Little I Know Of It, How Many Places I Have Still To Go, How Much More There Is To Learn. Maybe That's Enlightenment Enough - To Know That There Is No Final Resting Place Of The Mind, No Moment Of Smug Clarity. Perhaps Wisdom, At Least For Me, Means Realizing How Small I Am, And Unwise, And How Far I Have Yet To Go.

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.

I Think There's A Tendency To Over-jack And Over-umami Food These Days.

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.

Having Been A Chef For Some Many Years, I Understand What It's Like To Work Really, Really Hard To Get Good At Something, Only To Have Someone Piss All Over It.

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 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.

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.

An Ounce Of Sauce Covers A Multitude Of Sins.

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There Is No Other Place On Earth Even Remotely Like New Orleans. Don't Even Try To Compare It To Anywhere Else.

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

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.

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.

Get Up Early And Go To The Local Produce Markets. In Latin America And Asia, Those Are Usually Great Places To Find Delicious Food Stalls Serving Cheap, Authentic And Fresh Specialties.

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.

Doing Graphic Novels Is Cool! It's Fun! You Get To Write Something, And Then See It Visually Page By Page, Panel By Panel, Working With The Artist, You Get To See It Fleshed Out.

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.

My Love Of Soft, Runny Cheese - It's Impossible To Resist.

I Don't Have To Agree With You To Like You Or Respect You.

Admiration And Respect

Kitchen Confidential

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.

In America, There Might Be Better Gastronomic Destinations Than New Orleans, But There Is No Place More Uniquely Wonderful. ... With The Best Restaurants In New York, You'll Find Something Similar To It In Paris Or Copenhagen Or Chicago. But There Is No Place Like New Orleans. So It's A Must-see City Because There's No Explaining It, No Describing It. You Can't Compare It To Anything. So, Far And Away New Orleans.

What's The Opposite Of Suck? Un-suck?

I'm Sure One Of The Frustrations Of Being A Western Enthusiast Of Japanese Food And Culture Is You're Confronted Every Day With The Absolute Certainty That You Will Die Ignorant.

It's That Show Friends. Ruined Coffee Forever.

Oh Yes, There's Lots Of Great Food In America. But The Fast Food Is About As Destructive And Evil As It Gets. It Celebrates A Mentality Of Sloth, Convenience, And A Cheerful Embrace Of Food We Know Is Hurting Us.

I'm Not Impressed By Any Cooks Who Can Brag About A Filet Mignon. A Guy Who Can Take The Neck Of A Shank Or Can Use Tripe To Make Into Something Delicious Is Really Interesting To Me; That's Impressive.

I Can Unload My Opinion On Anybody At Anytime.

I Was A Serious Comic Collector And Fanboy As A Kid. I Wanted Very Badly To Draw Comic Books For A Lot Of My Childhood And Early Adolescence. So When You Have An Unfulfilled Dream Like That, When Years Later You Find Yourself In A Position To Make A Graphic Novel - Hell Yeah, I'm Going To Do That.

Good Food And Good Eating Are About Risk.

Bad Food Is Made Without Pride, By Cooks Who Have No Pride, And No Love. Bad Food Is Made By Chefs Who Are Indifferent, Or Who Are Trying To Be Everything To Everybody, Who Are Trying To Please Everyone. Bad Food Is Fake Food, Food That Shows Fear And Lack Of Confidence In People's Ability To Discern Or To Make Decisions About Their Lives.

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.

When You're Shooting That Fast End To End, You Wake Up In A Hotel And You Don't Know Where You Are. You're Dreaming Of Singapore, You Wake Up In Hong Kong. Or You Just Lose Track. It's One Of The Reasons I'm Staying In Hotels That I Know I've Stayed In Before, And They Don't Look Like Other Hotels.

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 Always Entertain The Notion That I'm Wrong, Or That I'll Have To Revise My Opinion. Most Of The Time That Feels Good; Sometimes It Really Hurts And Is Embarrassing.

Just Because I Like Sushi, Doesn't Mean I Can Make Sushi. I've Come To Well Understand How Many Years Just To Get Sushi Rice Correct. It's A Discipline That Takes Years And Years And Years. So, I Leave That To The Experts.

There's Something Not Normal About You If You're Writing A Book About Yourself, Or About Anything. And If You're The Kind Of Person Who Can Deal With Being Recognized By Strangers And If That's Tolerable Or Pleasing To You, And Not Immediately Terrifying, That's Not Normal Either.

When You Have A Child You're No Longer The Star Of The Movie.

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

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'd Love To Play Bass With Parliament Funkadelic, But I Can't Play Bass, So I Don't Think That's Going To Happen.

Cooking Professionally Is A Dominant Act, At All Times About Control. Eating Well, On The Other Hand, Is About Submission. It's About Giving Up All Vestiges Of Control, About Entrusting Your Fate Entirely To Someone Else. It's About Turning Off The Mean, Manipulative, Calculating, And Shrewd Person Inside You, And Slipping Heedlessly Into A New Experience As If It Were A Warm Bath. It's About Shutting Down The Radar And Letting Good Things Happen. Let It Happen To You.

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.

[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.

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.

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

[george] Orwell's Essays. It's Got It All. Great Writing, A Worldview That I Find Interesting And Useful, And Most Of It Timelessly True.

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.

You Can Call Me The Bad Boy Chef All You Want. I'm Not Going To Freak Out About It. I'm Not That Bad. I'm Certainly Not A Boy, And It's Been A While Since I've Been A Chef.

Very Few Restaurant Workers Could Even Dream Of Eating In The Restaurants They Work In. Many Do Not Make A Living Wage.

I'm Not Ted Nugent. My House Is Run, Essentially, By An Adopted, Fully Clawed Cat With A Mean Nature. I Would Never Hunt. I Would Never Wear Fur. I Would Never Go To A Bullfight. I'm Not Really A Meat And Potatoes Guy.

For Their Own Good, Vegetarians Should Never Be Allowed Near Fine Beers And Ales. It Will Only Make Them Loud And Belligerent, And They Lack The Physical Strength And Aggressive Nature To Back Up Any Drunken Assertions.

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.

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

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

I'm In No Position To Try To Tell People How To Live Their Family Life.

There's Always This Assumption That You're Going To Get Everything Right Immediately. And Any Professional Understands That That's Just Not So.

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.

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

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.

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

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

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’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.

If Somebody Crafts An Interesting Tweet That’ll Lead Me To Their Blog, I’m Going To Their Blog.

At The End Of A Dinner At My House, My Kitchen Sink Is Filled With Dishes And There's Nothing Pretty About The Garbage.

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.

I'm Evangelical On The Subject Of Some Chefs And Writers.

When You're Training For Jiu-jitsu, Particularly If You're Training For A Competition, You Have To Be Pretty Prescribed In The Variety Of What You Eat.

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

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

I Wouldn't Want To Compare Myself To David Byrne Whom I Consider A Genius, But What I Think What We Have In Common Is That He's Also A Guy Who Is Very Interested In The World And Who Has A Lot Of Passions Beyond Singing And Playing Guitar.

Food Is So Personal - I Mean Someone Is Talking To You When People Are Cooking For You. I Like To Hear An Identifiable Voice.

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

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."

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.

Unlicensed Hooch From A Stranger In A Parking Lot. Good Idea? Yes, Of Course It Is.

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

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.

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

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

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.

An Employer Of Mine Back In The '80s Was Kind Enough To Take Me On After A Rough Patch, And It Made A Big Difference In My Life That I Knew I Was The Sort Of Person Who Showed Up On Time. It's A Basic Tell Of Character.

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

My Family Is Very Far From Normal.

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.

There Is No Final Resting Place Of The Mind.

Kitchen Confidential

Tokyo Would Probably Be The Foreign City If I Had To Eat One City's Food For The Rest Of My Life, Every Day. It Would Have To Be Tokyo, And I Think The Majority Of Chefs You Ask That Question Would Answer The Same Way.

Anyone Who Doesn't Have A Great Time In San Francisco Is Pretty Much Dead To Me.

They're Professionals At This In Russia, So No Matter How Many Jell-o Shots Or Jager Shooters You Might Have Downed At College Mixers, No Matter How Good A Drinker You Might Think You Are, Don't Forget That The Russians - Any Russian - Can Drink You Under The Table.

You Know, It's Not The World I Would Have Wanted, For Sure.

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

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.

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

My Mom Had Julia Child And 'the Fannie Farmer Cookbook' On Top Of The Refrigerator, And She Had A Small Repertoire Of French Dishes.

Travel Changes You. As You Move Through This Life And This World You Change Things Slightly, You Leave Marks Behind, However Small. And In Return, Life - And Travel - Leaves Marks On You. Most Of The Time, Those Marks - On Your Body Or On Your Heart - Are Beautiful. Often, Though, They Hurt.

Anyone Who's A Chef, Who Loves Food, Ultimately Knows That All That Matters Is: Is It Good? Does It Give Pleasure?

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.

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 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.

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

Tough Situations

As You Move Through This Life...you Leave Marks Behind, However Small. And In Return, Life - And Travel - Leaves Marks On You.

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.

I've Been Very Careful About What I Say Yes To And What I Say No To. And I Think Seriously Always About... This May Be A Good Idea Right Now Or It May Be A Lot Of Money Right Now, But Will It Be Good For Me Five Years From Now? Will It Be Fun? Will It Make Me Hate Myself? I Think About All Of Those Things.

The Mishandling Of Food And Equipment With Panache Was Always Admired; To Some Extent, This Remains True To This Day. Butchers Still Slap Down Prime Cuts With Just A Little More Force And Noise Than Necessary. Line Cooks Can't Help Putting A Little English On Outgoing Plates, Spinning Them Into The Pass-through With Reverse Motion So They Curl Back Just Short Of The Edge. Oven Doors In Most Kitchens Have To Be Constantly Tightened Because Of Repeatedly Being Kicked Closed By Clog-shod Feet. And All Of Us Dearly Love To Play With Knives.

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.

I Need The Anesthetic Qualities Of The Local Fire Water.

Cream Rises. Excellence Does Have Its Rewards.

I'm A Pretty Decent Writer. It Comes Easy To Me. I Don't Agonize Over Sentences. I Write Like I Talk. I Try To Make Them Good Books.

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.

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.

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.

When I Cook, I Generally Stick With What I Know, What I'm Comfortable With, And What I Feel I've Paid My Dues Learning, And Am Good At.

My French Definitely Improves The More I Drink, As I Worry Less And Less About Absolutely Perfect Grammar. I Do Speak And Understand The Language, Just Not Particularly Well.

I’ve Been Really Fortunate In That I Guess I Was Hired To Do A Cook’s Tour, I Was Already A Known Quantity, Meaning I Had Written A Really Obnoxious Book And Nobody Expected Me To Be Anyone That I Wasn’t Already.

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