It is the nature of human beings not to be able to leave nature alone.

Salt is the only rock directly consumed by man. It corrodes but preserves, desiccates but is wrested from the water. ... It preserves things from corruption - even as it corrodes other things with its bite. A little of it fertilizes the land; a lot sterilizes it.

Animals are murdered to produce meat; vegetables are torn up, peeled, and chopped; most of what we eat is treated with fire; and chewing is designed remorselessly to finish what killing and cooking began. People naturally prefer that none of this should happen to them. Behind every rule of table etiquette lurks the determination of each person present to be a diner, not a dish.

Food-what is chosen from the possibilities available, how it is presented, how it is eaten, with whom and when, and how much time is allotted to cooking and eating it-is one of the means by which a society creates itself and acts out its aims and fantasies.

It is the nature of human beings not to be able to leave nature alone.

The ancient Greeks did not have to wrestle with the philosophical problem of the existence of evil. They did not claim their gods were good, just magnificent.

Salt represents the civilized: it requires know-how to get it, and a sophisticated combination of cooking and spoilt, jaded appetites to need it.