You don't need a silver fork to eat good food.

Creole is New Orleans city food. Communities were created by the people who wanted to stay and not go back to Spain or France.

In '71 or '72 I returned to New Orleans and stayed there. I started cooking Louisiana food. Of all the things I had cooked, it was the best-and it was my heritage.

We had no electricity, no gas. Food was probably our greatest entertainment - the most fun thing that we could do was food.

The bad part about being recognized is that when I walk into a restaurant and sit down, I've got to eat everything on the plate, whether it's good or bad. People would take it as an insult if I did otherwise.

I didn't want to do just another set of recipes. I think that's useless.

One of my missions was to teach.