I live in an old house with no closets and no built-ins. I hate big cupboards.

I don't even like firing people. I don't think I've ever said, 'You're fired' to anybody.

I adore summer entertaining. For a dinner party at the farm, I might prepare homemade fettuccine with porcini mushrooms, soft-shell crabs, spinach from the garden, and lemon tarts with fraises des bois for dessert.

There is no single recipe for success. But there is one essential ingredient: Passion

I'm never sick. Why get sick? It's a waste of time.

This is a funny story. We'd asked the guards every day for cappuccino. You know, just as a joke. And they'd come in with their cups of coffee and stuff. And so I get here and I have a spot for a cappuccino machine, and it didn't work. So I don't have any cappuccino ... I didn't miss the cappuccino, I missed the idea of cappuccino.

I support Alice Waters in her desire that there be a vegetable garden at the White House. I don't think they should rip up the Rose Garden, because that's something that I love. They should probably dig up another patch and grow some vegetables there.