Professional Cooking Quotes

I've had an untraditional trajectory with food: I was in my mom's home, then I was a college kid making mac and cheese and quesadillas, and then I was a professional cook. I never had that time where you figure out how to cook for yourself at home.

I have a terrible tendency to lick my fingers when I cook. So much so that I got a telling off from my pastry teacher years ago, who said it would hinder my prospects.

I cook for a living; I'm not a scheduler.

Murder is commoner among cooks than among members of any other profession.

Fifteen years ago, France was the promised land of cooking. So I looked at a map, found five restaurants and faxed them to ask for a job. Within five minutes, I got a reply from the then three- star Le Jardin des Sens in Montpellier.

Being a chef is the best job in the world.

Very good cooks who are employed as 'chefs' rarely refer to themselves as 'chefs.' They refer to themselves as 'cooks.'

My chefs don't apply for 'Top Chef'. They all know that there is no way. At the end of the process I look at the resumes of the last 25 options just to make sure they've never worked for me before.

I grew up around food and in a restaurant, so it never dawned on me that this was a thing to do; it just was. Then I found it as a profession in my mid-twenties after years of bad decisions and depression. The first step was going to the bookstore and learning about this craft. Then applying in kitchens and just getting to work.

I got my degree in culinary arts in 1978.

Cooks are an undervalued, awesome profession.

I ended up wanting to be a cook and hold my own in a restaurant.

My dream as a passionate cook has been to go to Le Cordon Bleu. Never could my most incredible dream have lived up to the experience. The food, the lesson, the chef, the ingredients - all the best of the best. I see why Le Cordon Bleu is world-renowned.

I hope the cooks who are working for me now are getting that kind of experience so they can use what they're learning now as a foundation for a great career.

I always knew I wanted to be a chef.

So I quit my job and went to the New England Culinary Institute for the full two years and worked in the restaurant industry after that until finally I thought I had a grasp on what I needed to do what I do.

Shows like 'Top Chef,' 'Hell's Kitchen' have helped bring attention to the culinary world on a whole, but you have to be cautious it doesn't get out of hand.

For decades, many blacks were reluctant to pursue a profession that was associated with servitude. If you went to school, it was to become a lawyer or doctor. Older generations didn't understand why one would spend money to learn how to chop, peel, dice, and saute vegetables when that trade could be taught at home.

I could not be more thrilled to be writing about the recipes I love and think are essential to any novice home cook, professional, and somewhere in between.

I started cooking around 9 years old. I would make crepes at home for my parents. By 15 years old, I had started my apprenticeship at a bakery.

I am a chef through and through. Everything I do - whether it is cooking for kids in Harlem or cooking in a fine dining establishment - all my days are consumed by food.

In 1990 at Harveys, when I was 28 years old, I became the youngest chef to win two Michelin stars. It was a huge achievement.

Let me ask you: Who do you prefer, a clown organizing your menu - with all due respect to Mr. McDonald - or a chef? I do believe it's a very simple answer.

I am not a chef. I can't claim that title. The difference is a cook doesn't have a degree. A chef has formal education. It has nothing to do with talent or actual preparation - one just can't claim the title if you don't have degree.

It's one thing to execute dishes on your own time for family and friends, but quite another to perform and be judged in a competition. And that's what cooking in a high profile restaurant is. It's a competition. You're up against every other three-star restaurant in your city, and if you want to stay in business, you'd better deliver.