Mario Batali Quotes

I look forward to the spring vegetables because the season is so short. Mushrooms, edible foraged herbs, wild leeks, early season asparagus.

There's nothing I like more than picking fresh vegetables then putting them in the dinner you make that night.

I loved the experience of going to the farmers' market, seeing where your food is grown, turning it into something delicious.

I cook. I go to farmers markets in London and cook really good sort of organic foods.

California is lucky, the East Coast is lucky because we get great seafood and a lot of produce from Florida, locally in good weather, but in the winter we have to buy it.

I've become a produce snob. I like to eat food that's in season.

I love the idea of farm to table and farmer's markets. I enjoy a meal more if I know I'm eating something that's good quality and good for me.

I grew up shopping from farm stands. Dad taught me how to smell a good cantaloupe and thump a watermelon for ripeness.

Growing up eating fruits and vegetables fresh from our farm added a lot to the way I taste and look at food today, and I wanted the same for my kids and other kids.

I love to shop at the farmer's market or grab something from the garden and roast that.

The better the ingredients, the more farmers I can buy from, the closer I feel to the food I want to make that represents what I care about as a chef.

I remember, around age three, peas growing in the back garden. Pinching them from their pods and popping them in the mouth was my first realisation that food came from somewhere other than a shelf.

It's difficult to think anything but pleasant thoughts while eating a homegrown tomato.

I grew up with that farm-to-table dining before it was sweeping the nation. I do think there's some value to really throwing yourself into food and embracing where it comes from.

I really like cooking according to the season. I like to get creative with what's fresh.

The flavour of something fresh out of the ground is 10 times better than something that's been flown halfway across the world.

For me, summer hasn't really started until tomatoes reappear in local farmers' markets.

I know when you think about the South, you think about fried foods, but we eat a tremendous amount of vegetables. I have my own garden, so vegetables have always been a big part of my life. I love broccoli. I love fresh beets. It's not all about the fried chicken and the biscuits.

When you grow up close to poultry and fields and gardens and open-air markets, you can't help but develop an instinct for quality food.

We've become slaves to words like 'local,' 'fresh,' and 'seasonal.' We all want to be Thomas Jefferson's agrarian hero, but sustainable food is a difficult beast.

In California, you're on a first-name basis with fruit. You take a beautiful Blenheim, you don't want to mess with it.

If you grow the food you eat, it tastes better. Seasonal vegetables are grown at the right time, and you can make sure everything matures on the plant or on the tree. It's as fresh as you can get.

I grew up on an organic farm in England. And I was a vegetarian from an early age - not just for health, not for the environment - just because I didn't believe in killing animals to eat them.

It's rubbish to say that just because it's organic, it's better. There's good organic, and there's bad organic. We should all be thinking about taste, not some stamp on the package.

Buy local fruits and veggies at the grocery store. You will support local businesses and cut down on all the fuel that is used to truck produce around from state to state.