I say grace. I'm a big believer in grace. I happen to believe in a God that made all the food and so I'm pretty grateful for that and I thank him for that. But I'm also thankful for the people that put the food on the table.

Culinary tradition is not always based on fact. Sometimes it's based on history, on habits that come out of a time when kitchens were fueled by charcoal.

I love to have battles of the wits with people that can dish fast and dirty - and it leads to problems occasionally, 'cause I can sound mean without attempting to be mean.

Believe me, a grain is a terrible thing to waste.

Molecular gastronomy is not bad... but without sound, basic culinary technique, it is useless.

What tends to happen is that people will go - they've got hot broth, you know, they've added some liquid to their drippings, they've brought that up to heat. And then they try to add in a big clump of just kind of a handful of flour, and of course, it turns into library paste.

I do like artfully breaking rules.