It's essential to make sure you have proper kitchen tools for food storage - like cling wrap, bags, and containers - because they help keep food fresher longer.
I like all of McClure's pickles, but my personal favorites are the spicy ones.
It's amazing the relationships you forge in a kitchen. When you cooperate in an environment that's hot. Where there's a lot of knives. You're trusting your well-being with someone you've never before met or known.
The hardest thing for me is restraint.
I bent my head over a stove in my early 20s and picked it up in my 30s.
If you want to have a relationship, at some point you have to let yourself get caught. That's what I did. I got caught.
Winter blues are cured every time with a potato gratin paired with a roast chicken.
If I want my daughter to try something, I eat it in front of her repeatedly without forcing the issue and, with some trial and error, the world is our oyster!
My reasons for becoming a chef are somewhat of a cliche. I always loved to eat but it was watching my parents cook that really served as the impetus for my career choice.
The hardest thing about being a full time chef is leaving my work behind when I go home at night. I'll toss and turn about a menu item or forget to order produce and wake up at 4 A.M. in a cold sweat over some artichokes.
I used to sleep with the phone right by my pillow but I'm getting better. Now it sits on the table a few feet away.
Give yourself enough time to really learn how to cook.
I find myself hoping I can get on a TV show, and then people from Oklahoma will come to my restaurant. Then I'll be able to make enough money to open my own place.
Walnuts are so rich. I also love that you can chew them for five minutes. Then I eat a couple of golden raisins as a palate cleanser because they are really tart, and then more walnuts. It's a great snack for me.
I didn't harbor a huge desire to become a chef until I graduated from college.
I didn't cook that much as a kid. My mother was cooking, and I was her helper. We made dishes together.
I love watching a single pork chop seasoned with garlic and shallots cook and see the fat bubble around it.
My mom is a self-taught home cook, so books that offer guidelines on how to organize menus are critical to 'cook from the book' people like her.
I know that some people use lavender, incense, and cake as sedatives, but for me, a 'nose bath' in an old book just does something.
Dione Lucas has been obscured by larger-than-life personalities like Julia Child, but she had it going on. She is like the horse that came in second place, whose name we can't remember. It takes more than just one horse to make a race.
