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.

I do my very best to avoid shark fin.

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.

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.

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.

Being a vegan is a first-world phenomenon, completely self-indulgent.

Turning your nose up at a genuine and sincere gesture of hospitality is no way to travel or to make friends around the world.