Food is "everyday"-it has to be, or we would not survive for long. But food is never just something to eat. It is something to find or hunt or cultivate first of all.

Breakfast is the best time for me to figure out what my kids are doing. Right after you wake them up at breakfast, you pepper them with questions. You can get in there because they're not protecting what they thought was cool: "What happened yesterday?" "Oh, Matthew stole my book and ran away and it was really annoying..." That wouldn't happen after lunch, because their defenses are up. In the morning, if you lull them into a comfortable place, you get more honesty, and that's without being a detective.

I've been lucky enough in 20 years in the media to have a nice soap box that put me in a position to describe to an American viewership that Tuscany is different from Umbria, and it's different from Emilia-Romagna and, not that that was news, but it was never presented to them in a way that was, "Hey, look. This is a different plate from that different place." And although we all think of "spaghetti, lasagna, ciao," as what Italy is all about, there's all of this great stuff... I was merely an interpreter. I wasn't the developer of the content.

Protein has been intensely over-represented on the plate. Now, the garden should be the main drag for main courses.

Food is "everyday"-it has to be, or we would not survive for long. But food is never just something to eat. It is something to find or hunt or cultivate first of all.

I don't think fine dining is dying, but I think those rare occasions when you really want the fanciness are diminishing... I think a lot of people are going to find simpler, more casual ways to enjoy an experience.

The kitchen really is the castle itself. This is where we spend our happiest moments and where we find the joy of being a family.