My Favorite Quotes
“There is no sauce in the world like hunger.” Miguel de Cervantès (1547-1616), Don Quixote de la Mancha
«Tell me what you eat and I shall tell you what you are.» Jean Anthelme Brillat Savarin (1755-1826), The Physiology of Taste
“If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen.” Harry S. Truman
“The very discovery of the new world was the by-product of a dietary quest.” Arthur M. Schlesinger
“The pleasures of the table belong to all times and ages, to every country and every day; they go hand in hand with all our other pleasures, outlast them, and remain to console us for their loss.” Jean Anthelme Brillat Savarin, The Physiology of Taste
“Perfection is achieved when science and art come together.. and mother nature agrees.” Doug Gore (a wine maker) - this is one of my favorites ever, and I got it off a wine ad in a magazine!
“Wine is man’s most succesful effort to translate the perishable into the permanent.” John Arlott (probably another wine maker ad)
“If something is in me which can be called religious, then it is the unbounded admiration for the structure of the world so far as our science can reveal it.” Einstein
“Everything in moderation, including moderation.” I don’t know where this comes from but I love it.
«La différence entre un bon restaurant et un excellent restaurant n’est qu’une question de détails.» Alain Ducasse
«En matière de cuisine, il n’ y a pas de principes, il n’y en a qu’un, qui est de donner satisfaction à ceux qu’on sert.» Antonin Carême (1784-1833)
“Comfort me with apples, for I am sick of love.” Song of Solomon (and Ruth Reichl)
«What does cookery mean? It means the knowledge of Medea and of Circe, and of Calypso, and Sheba. It means knowledge of herbs, and fruits, and balms and spices.. It means the economy of your great-grandmother and the science of modern chemistry, and French art, and Arabian hospitality. It means, in fine, that you are to see imperatively that everyone has something nice to eat.” John Ruskin (1819-1900)
“Never eat more than you can lift.” Miss Piggy
“Live in each season as it passes, breathe the air, drink the drink, taste the fruit, and resign yourself to the influences of each.” Henry David Thoreau
“I’m a great believer in luck, and I find that the harder I work, the more I have of it.” Thomas Jefferson
“The dark clouds thunder over us, the rain pours down, but we cultivate our asparagus like we did before.” Louis Dudeck, our great Canadian philosopher
My MFK Fisher page:
«I am more of me in France, more of the way I think I am. I’m more awake, more aware, and as far as senses and personality, stronger. Every minute is more of a minute there.”
“When we exist without thought or thanksgiving, we are not men, but beasts.”
“How not to be an earthworm” (Greatest title ever...)
“It seems to me, that our three basic needs for security and love, are so mixed and mingled and entwined that we cannot straightly think of one without the others.. There is communion of more than our bodies when bread is broken and wine drunk. And that is my answer when people ask me: why do you write about hunger, and not wars and love?”
Fernand Point quotes:
‘As far as cuisine is concerned, one must read everything, see everything, hear everything, try everything, observe everything, in order to retain, in the end, just a little bit!’
‘Butter! Give me butter! Always butter!’
‘A good cuisinier never dirties his apron outside work.’
‘Chickens must spend four or five days in the refrigerator, never the freezer, after having been killed.’
‘Before judging a thin man, one must get some information. Perhaps he was once fat.’
‘The taste of walnut oil goes very well with red wine.’
‘A good apprentice cook must be as polite with the dishwasher as with the chef.’
«Un bon repas doit être aussi harmonieux qu’une symphonie, et aussi bien construit qu’une cathédrale.» Fernand Point (1897-1955)
«Success is the sum of a lot of small things correctly done.» Fernand Point
“Cuisine is not invariable like a Codex formula. But one must guard against tampering with the essential bases.” Fernand Point
‘The duty of a good cuisinier is to transmit to the generations who will replace him, everything he has learned and experienced.’
‘I have been so well nurtured throughout my life that I’m sure to die completely cured.’
And More..
‘Food is life, the rest is parsley’
"All I want is the truth, just give me some truth" John Lennon, Imagine.
‘Use all your senses, all the time. ... Take pains with the work; do it carefully. Relish the details. Enjoy your hunger. And remember why you’re there.” That could be a recipe for life.’ Laura Shapiro in describing Julia Child in herbook, A Penguin Life.
Danny Meyer (owner of a restauant empire in NYC including Union Square Café and Gramercy Tavern) in an interview about business: "There's not a day that I don't wake up with a little bit of fear that, if we don't give it our all, we won't be on top."
Useful words of wisdom passed on to me by my Dad once upon a time:
‘God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference’
‘The best things in life aren’t things’ Art Buchwald (American humorist)
Brillat Savarin (for a laugh):
‘Gourmandise is not unbecoming to women; it suits the delicacy of their organs and recompenses them for some pleasures they cannot enjoy and for some evils to which they are doomed.’
‘No town can live peacefully whatever its laws when its citizens do nothing but feast and drink and tire themselves out in the cares of love’ Plato
‘The appreciation of pleasure can be an anchor of one’s humanity’ From Eat, Pray, Love (by Elizabeth Gilbert)
‘To make a good salad is to be a brilliant diplomat – to know how much oil to put with one’s vinegar’ Oscar Wilde
‘I think it is a sad reflection on our civilization that while we can and do measure the tempurature in the atmosphere of Venus, we don’t know what goes on inside our soufflés’ Nicolas Kurti (the original molecular gastronomer)
‘A true friend is someone who knows you’re a good egg even if you’re a little cracked’
Other favourite phrases (not quite quotes) from my humble kitchen:
“Everything great starts with onions.”
“When in doubt, add bacon.”
“Taste, taste, taste, and use your head - ta tête, Ostie.”
“Don’t fuck with Murphy.” (as in Murphy’s law)
'Chop, chop'! (as in get to it, carry on)