To eat figs off the tree in the very early morning, when they have been barely touched by the sun, is one of the exquisite pleasures of the Mediterranean.

Even more then long hours in the kitchen, fine meals require ingenious organization and experience which is a pleasure to acquire.

I would probably never have learned to cook.

The grotesque prudishness and archness with which garlic is treated in [England] has led to the superstition that rubbing the bowl with it before putting the salad in gives sufficient flavor. It rather depends whether you are going to eat the bowl or the salad.

It is a very great mistake to suppose, as a few English cooks still do, that spaghetti and macaroni should be soaked in water before cooking.

I don't copy recipes without trying them out. I don't reprint without trying them again.

Summer cooking implies a sense of immediacy, a capacity to capture the essence of the fleeting moment.