Its not about passion. Passion is something that we tend to overemphasize, that we certainly place too much importance on. Passion ebbs and flows. To me, it's about desire. If you have constant, unwavering desire to be a cook, then u'll be a great cook.

The law of diminishing returns is something I really believe in.

My childhood wasn't full of wonderful culinary memories.

Vegetables to me are - I don't want to say the most exciting part of cooking, but certainly a very exciting part of cooking, because they continue to change. They come into season and they go through different phases.

I wanted to write about what we were doing at the French Laundry, the recipes and the stories.

Hopefully, imparting what's important to me, respect for the food and that information about the purveyors, people will realize that for a restaurant to be good, so many pieces have to come together.

You don't know when inspiration is going to come. But you have to be aware of what's going on around you, so that at any moment, when inspiration happens, you're ready for it and you interpret it.