[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'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.

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 feel that if Jacques Pepin shows you how to make an omelet, the matter is pretty much settled. That's God talking.

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.

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.

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.