Christina Tosi Quotes

Because I am a chef, I have to try new things all the time, so it's been really good to have my family to be able to be there and test everything out.

I write in the morning - and then I'm always experimenting and tasting recipes for the books.

The Momofuku Culinary Lab started as a space where we could focus on creating and innovating. I didn't want us to worry about working on projects in a restaurant; there are just too many distractions in service and running a kitchen to be able to focus on creating your dishes.

I tested a lot of old cornbread recipes and most of them were bland or tough.

I love to eat, I love to feed people, and I'm a great cook. I joked with my friends that I wanted to write a book where desserts had to be extensively researched, since I have a terrible sweet tooth. My particular downfall is cake.

I used to have a very unmediated experience of food but, because of the recipe testing, I've lost that now. I can't switch it off even when I'm on holiday.

I'm really a scientist. I follow recipes exactly - until I decide not to. And then I'll follow something else exactly. I may decide I could turn this peach tart into a plum tart, but if I'm following a recipe, I follow it exactly.

What does happen in 'Gourmet,' we had eight test kitchens, and at any given time, there were, like, ten or twelve test cooks. And whenever anybody finished something, they would yell, 'Taste!' and everyone would go running towards it, and then taste, and then brutally deconstruct the dish.

I'm a very improvisational cook. I sort of like to make things up as I go along. I'm quite creative in the kitchen.

One summer, when I was on break from architecture school in Tijuana, my aunt gave me a summer job cleaning up and peeling garlic, and I got to see her in her element. She was so passionate and such a good teacher, I decided to quit architecture school and go to culinary school in Los Angeles.

My family is usually the first guinea pigs to try out my new recipes.

I enjoy experimenting with food and dish out innovative food items as well.

I love a good challenge of looking with new eyes at a tried and true recipe in my recipe Rolodex.

Cooking requires confident guesswork and improvisation-- experimentation and substitution, dealing with failure and uncertainty in a creative way

Sometimes there is dogma in baking and sometimes there is not - you just have to know when to break the rules and when to follow them.

With patisserie, unlike with cooking, you have to be very precise; you can't just add a bit of this and a bit of that, because your cake starts melting. There's a lot of technique involved, but you can still be creative. Because of my artistic background, when I have that freedom I tend to do things a little bit out of the box.

Pastry school is great for a foundation and introducing you to basic techniques, but it is really up to the chefs to practice, practice, practice and refine their techniques.

My dad cooks beef in Guinness, I don't know why he does that, he adds chocolate to his spaghetti Bolognese too, I'm scared about doing that, it would like chocolate Bolognese if I did it, he likes to make it look rich that's why, so yes, my dad experiments but I don't.

My comfort zone is in a kitchen.

Part of what makes a great chef is the ability to adapt, cook, and to taste. A great chef will use all their food knowledge, food memories, and senses to work with each ingredient and apply themselves to the dish they are creating.

I'm not heavily into baking.

I like that talented chefs are able to keep coming up with new ways of preparing food - it really is an art form.

The 'Momofuku Milk Bar' cookbook is rather technical. I wanted it to feel like you were walking into the doors of our kitchen, it was your first day at work, and we were going to teach you everything.

Oh my God, I love 'Bake Off!' I absolutely love it. It's amazing.

I love creating new things. It's difficult to be creative once a restaurant's open. People want the same dishes. For me, the creativity is in opening a new place and starting a new menu.