One of the secrets, and pleasures, of cooking is to learn to correct something if it goes awry; and one of the lessons is to grin and bear it if it cannot be fixed.

The best way to execute French cooking is to get good and loaded and whack the hell out of a chicken.

I was going to be a great woman novelist. Then the war came along and I think it's hard for young people today, don't you, to realize that when World War II happened we were dying to go and help our country.

I would far prefer to have things happen as they naturally do, such as the mousse refusing to leave the mold, the potatoes sticking to the skillet, the apple charlotte slowly collapsing. One of the secrets of cooking is to learn to correct something if you can, and bear with it if you cannot.

Fake food -- I mean those patented substances chemically flavored and mechanically bulked out to kill the appetite and deceive the gut -- is unnatural, almost immoral, a bane to good eating and good cooking.

...the waiters carried themselves with a quiet joy, as if their entire mission in life was to make their customers feel comfortable and well tended.

I'd like for people to be able to go to the universities and get a degree in fine arts-gastronomy.