Quotes from Dominique Crenn

Anybody that comes in, a new person is supposed to spend six months downstairs in the basement doing prep work. I didn't. I got on the line right away.

I think I was eight or nine when I had my first long-form tasting menu.

Being a chef is about feeding people, which is part of the story of all humanity.

We see the effects of climate change on food prices and in so many other ways.

I think Los Angeles is an incredible city. It's also very diverse, which I love about it.

My restaurant is an expression of myself - my fantasies. Where I've been, and where I want to be. I think of my cooking as very emotional.

I am just a little fish in the sea. But I do understand that everything that I do could have a little impact.

I came to the U.S. in the 1990s. I worked all around, including at Stars, and in 1996, I became the chef of Yoyo Bistro, which used to be Elka. During my one-year tenure there, I met a lot of French chefs at the time.

San Francisco needs to become a city where you have late night offerings.

I live in a condo outside of San Francisco, in a town called Larkspur, near a marine area.

My food is about texture and technique.

When I came to America, I saw the inequality right away with the food industry. And I don't really talk about it in the book, but the racism here, it's so predominant and so impregnated in the history of America.

I loved school, although I got bored very easily. I liked literature. I loved philosophy. I didn't like math. I was good at English. I didn't like German. I was good at sports and continued to compete on all sorts of teams.

Professional kitchens are studied to cook for countless people. At home, design often wins over functionality. A restaurant must be functional.

I've participated at summits where I was the only chef. I was surrounded with thinkers and writers and innovators.

Meat is complicated. We have to be thoughtful about the ecosystem that we're living in and not to destroy it because of the instant gratification and the demand of others.

Obviously, growing up in France, I had foie gras probably when I was two years old. Writing about it and understanding what's going on in the world about it, I think I became more conscious and more thoughtful about things, for sure.

As a chef, I've always been very conscious and very thoughtful about the way that I buy food or have my farmers produce it.

My grandmother was kind, but she knew what she wanted and she wasn't afraid to give a command. When, eventually, I ran my own kitchen, I realized I had a leadership model reaching back into my earliest memories.

I'm most excited about people being more conscious about their eating habits.

Like I say, Michelin is Michelin. It's nice people are recognized, but at the end of the day, the star doesn't define you, it's what you do with it, and it's what you do in life in general. I think it helps you with the business, but it doesn't help you as a person.

People ask me how come you say hello to your customers every night? It's because I need that. It's not just a restaurant. It's my house.

I kind of do not like the word chef. Chef, giving you a sense of hierarchy and power. To be a good cook and to be a good leader, it has to come from within and to understand others.

For a menu to come together, you have to have sweetness, saltiness, crunchiness... it's all about balance.