The kitchen is the heart of every home, for the most part. It evokes memories of your family history.

Sitting down at the table is a sacred event. It's the heart of the home. People have ginormous homes or crappy little homes, but the kitchen is where we always end up sitting. It's where the stories happen, the family happens.

When entertaining, it's great to wow your guests with an outstanding recipe, but it's also very important to design a menu that's not too demanding of yourself, otherwise everybody will have fun but you. A great appetizer or simpler dish is a good way to work a menu that's delicious but does not impose too much effort or time spent in the kitchen.

Some people in LA are addicted. They have to be here. My personal life is stronger than my professional life, in terms of priorities.

For me, its like go ahead and eat. Live your life. I mean, I've just seen so much death, you know, as of late, being in my 40s, of people getting sick or, you know, whatever, that I just feel like, you know what? You never know with life. Eat. Enjoy yourself. Just try to be healthy and, you know, and watch it.

I live in Italy part time, and they're obsessed with what's happening in LA too. They make fun of Americans, but the world wants to know what's going on in Hollywood.

When my mother was raising me, she moved us upstate to the Woodstock area. Our closest neighbor was a mile away. She planted all her own vegetables.