Don't dunk your nigiri in the soy sauce. Don't mix your wasabi in the soy sauce. If the rice is good, complement your sushi chef on the rice.

I wanted to write in Kitchenese, the secret language of cooks, instantly recognizable to anyone who has ever dunked french fries for a summer job or suffered under the despotic rule of a tyrannical chef or boobish owner.

I'd like to play bass like Bootsy Collins. I'm serious. That would be my dream.

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 won't eat in a restaurant with filthy bathrooms. This isn't a hard call. They let you see the bathrooms. If the restaurant can't be bothered to replace the puck in the urinal or keep the toilets and floors clean, then just imagine what their refrigeration and work spaces look like.

I think of [street food] as the antidote to fast food; it's the clear alternative to the king, the clown and the colonel.

Context and memory play powerful roles in all the truly great meals in one's life.