I was working for a chef a long time ago who told me to not skip steps or be in a hurry. Success in a kitchen is more like a marathon and less like a sprint. Rising up the ranks too quickly isn't necessarily a good thing. This advice was from a guy who was sorry he had done that and didn't want me to do the same.
We have a funny sort of love/hate relationship with critics because, unfortunately, in the art/commerce dance that we do, they drive people to the restaurant. Regardless of sometimes how well we prepare the food, if people don't know that we're out there, if someone isn't talking about us, you guys aren't coming.
I have no interest in vegetarians whatsoever. Zero. Less than zero.
It wasn't the traditional cooking most people do. For me, as a young chef, Thanksgiving meant going to work in the kitchen at places like Gotham, JoJo and Jean-Georges.
It's been a struggle to get people to come eat for fun. You know, the way they listen to music. You can do all kinds of things with music. But food - it's something people need, and that changes everything. You start playing with it, people have all sorts of reactions.
Fish butchering means a lot to me as a chef; I take pride in it and get a lot of joy from filleting fish, working with fish, breaking down fish, trying to understand fish.
It's just about asking why. We as cooks historically have been very, very technically proficient but not technically informed as to why we do what we do. Modernist cuisine is about that knowledge.
There will never be a right or wrong way to cook something, but there will always be a more informed way.
Every dish doesn't have to be showy, and every dish doesn't have to slap you in the face with technique.
I would say that molecular gastronomy is a field of science. I would - I would say that it's probably lumped under chemistry, maybe. Because cooking, while it has certainly biology and some physics, it's mostly chemistry.
I think I can poach a pretty mean egg the old-fashioned way.
The most important thing with turkey is to let it rest - most people don't let it rest long enough. It will get juicier the longer you let it rest.
There will never be a universal way of cooking, but information will always be universally useful.
Extremely ripe things are not ideal for pickling. If you pour a hot liquid over super ripe strawberries, you're going to have strawberry soup.
I have strong feelings about cookbooks because I am a lover of them and student of them and devourer of them and collect them. I find them to be a great source of inspiration. When I was a cook and not making much money, I always used to spend most of what I had on cookbooks.
I don't like the term 'dinner as theater,' because that implies something thespian that I don't want to tie into this, but there are plenty of times that people go out to dinner because they want to have an experience. There are, however, probably many more times that people go out to eat because it's 7 o'clock and it's time to eat.
Okay, a lot of people think that I'm someone known for a love of eggs and egg cookery. Being asked to endorse an egg yolk separator, I mean, I understood where it came from, but it didn't seem necessarily like something that was ultimately worth pursuing.
Neighborhoods change. In some ways, it's part of the beauty of New York City. It's in a constant state of flux.
Whites cook at a lower temperature, set at a lower temperature than yolks. That, to me, is very interesting. That has opened up - as an egg lover, that has opened up sort of a world of possibilities, of applications.
Green vegetables are something that fascinate chefs; the ability to keep vegetables green. How do we keep them green? What makes them green? Why are they green? And then that sort of army green. Why do they go from bright vibrant electric green to army green, and how can we avoid that?
