Time is the missing ingredient in our recipes-and in our lives.

While it is true that many people simply can't afford to pay more for food, either in money or time or both, many more of us can. After all, just in the last decade or two we've somehow found the time in the day to spend several hours on the internet and the money in the budget not only to pay for broadband service, but to cover a second phone bill and a new monthly bill for television, formerly free. For the majority of Americans, spending more for better food is less a matter of ability than priority. p.187

At home I serve the kind of food I know the story behind.

Cooking for yourself is the only sure way to take back control of your diet from the food scientists and food processors, and to guarantee you're eating real food rather than edible foodlike substances, with their unhealthy oils, high-fructose corn syrup, and surfeit of salt.

I still think we have a long way to go on rebuilding a culture of cooking. Everyday simple cooking.

Experiences that banish irony are much better for living than for writing.

This is part of human nature, the desire to change consciousness.