As they say in Italy, Italians were eating with a knife and fork when the French were still eating each other. The Medici family had to bring their Tuscan cooks up there so they could make something edible.
Mario BataliFind something you love, because if you love what you do, you'll never spend a day at work.
Mario BataliYou sit down at Katz's and you eat the big bowl of pickles and you're eating the pastrami sandwich, and halfway through you say to yourself, I should really wrap this up and save it for tomorrow. But the sandwich is calling you: Remember the taste you just had. So fatty. It's what you want. It's what you are! I've never gotten home from Katz's with a doggie bag in my hand. A pastrami sandwich at Katz's is what's bad and good about food. It's the sacred and the profane.
Mario BataliI think the more prominent the actual product in its raw nature is to its final consumer, the more sympathy and likelihood they'll consume it they'll have. Some friends of mine are trying to do these rooftop farms in Brooklyn, and I love that idea. As long as they're using clean water and real soil and creating delicious things by the sun, then brilliant.
Mario Batali