My family is very far from normal.

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 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."

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.

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.

You have to love a town where you can both smoke and gamble in a pharmacy.

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.