Yotam Ottolenghi Quotes

I don't like food that's too carefully arranged; it makes me think that the chef is spending too much time arranging and not enough time cooking. If I wanted a picture I'd buy a painting.

The Italians and Spanish, the Chinese and Vietnamese see food as part of a larger, more essential and pleasurable part of daily life. Not as an experience to be collected or bragged about - or as a ritual like filling up a car - but as something else that gives pleasure, like sex or music, or a good nap in the afternoon.

I sometimes feel that more lousy dishes are presented under the banner of pate than any other.

I want e by Jose Andres to be a discovery, to be a journey. I want people to find it and be astonished.

I lived with a German family. I learned about schnitzel from Ritta Seiffer. When she cooked she'd get the oil really hot so that it sealed everything and in the middle was very juicy. That's the secret to a great schnitzel.

For a State Dinner there are many people involved in the menu planning—many cooks in the stew as it were.

I've been learning how to soft-scramble eggs. And once you've had an amazing soft-scrambled egg, you cannot go back. It takes a little bit more work, but they're really great.

'Iron Chef America' is so real. Imagine putting on television the whole process of making that food, the technique. It's all about technique. It doesn't even matter if you show the faces sometimes.

The old saying, 'An army marches on its stomach' has never been more true than in film and television. If it's good, cheerful, and exciting and full of great yummy things, then everyone does really well. If it's the opposite, it's very disappointing.

Having curry for breakfast is a thing of beauty.

After coating pasta with tomato-rich meat sauce, my mom would drizzle the bottom of a nonstick pot with oil and put it all back in to form a dark crust of tangled noodles. Once she unmolded it at the table like a cake, my brothers and I would excitedly cut into it, verbally laying claim to our preferred pieces.

I love to cook. I love to entertain.

I learned that things taste better on pretty plates.

A plate of food hits the table, lands right in front of you. One of two things happens. Either you sit up and look at it and react to it, or nothing happens. If nothing happens then that restaurant is stuck in mediocrity forever.

And believe me, a good piece of chicken can make anybody believe in the existence of God.

If you have never tasted a braised vegetable, you'll find it is a revelation.

Vane passed the mashed potatoes across Bride to Fury, who stared at them with a fierce frown "What are these?" he asked. "Potatoes," Vane told him. "What did they do to them?

Eating is the secret to good cooking.

You never forget a beautiful thing that you have made. Even after you eat it, it stays with you - always.

Nobody pours stuffing like you do, my friend.

I think that there is a role for food to be art; and when food is art, it can have drama, it can have spectacle, it can be theatrical. It can be this amazing experience.

Cheese has always been a food that both sophisticated and simple humans love.

Food is a subject of conversation more spiritually refreshing even than the weather, for the number of possible remarks about the weather is limited, whereas of food you can talk on and on and on.

The sheen of ocean gleams on the blue fish-plate.

The strands of spaghetti were vital, almost alive in my mouth, and the olive oil was singing with flavor. It was hard to imagine that four simple ingredients [olive oil, pasta, garlic and cheese] could marry so perfectly.