Quotes from Haylie Duff

I love to cook. It is a simple pastime.

When I was a kid - and I don't know why, it's the most random thing - I wanted to be a speech therapist for little kids. I knew I wanted to do something with kids.

I always feel happy when I'm making smart decisions with food - instead of focusing on what I shouldn't eat, I focus on what I should eat. It's all about being happy and feeling good!

We were never the family that ordered pizza, and my mom never came home with a bucket of fried chicken. My mom always made home-cooked meals. We always sat down at the dinner table as a family.

I love cookbooks. I collect them.

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.

The best advice for building up confidence in the kitchen - start small. Don't go after the super intense Julia Child coq au vin recipe. Pick something simple and tackle it.

It's funny the way life works. Sometimes you go around in a weird path to find out exactly what it is that you love to do, and I'm happy that I've sort of discovered something that makes me really happy.

I love learning how to make new dishes.

In my actual life, a food adventure is my favorite thing to do.

I grew up in Texas, and I think anybody who grows up in the Midwest or in the South, it's just a different way of life.

I used to have a BlackBerry. E-mail and text messaging and all those things that make life so much easier now.

I think the first thing you should learn is how to roast a chicken. Once you can roast a chicken, you can pretty much figure out anything else. And who doesn't like roasted chicken? It's a classic.

We had a ranch, growing up, that we used to spend a lot of time at. I guess anything from the ranch house would probably be some of my favorite childhood memories.

I guess I would be most grateful for my family and my friends and my dogs, my boyfriend. I'm grateful for a lot. I'm grateful to be healthy.

I like making stories and characters that people can relate to. I also like giving the audience a departure from whatever they're thinking about in their life and enjoying a show or a movie.

I try to stay away from too many reality shows. I catch the 'Housewives,' but they tend to give me a little anxiety.

With theater, you have to really be able to listen and to respond to other people on stage. You're all constantly on your toes. And then with film and television, you can get a second take and things like that.

My mom, ever since we were little girls, has really always rallied us together - my sister, our friends - to instill in us the fact that other people don't have what we have, so we have to be really thankful for things.

I was always a huge fan of Nora Ephron.

I was 12 when I got a small part in a movie in Texas. And in my spare time, I play with my dogs and write music and go out with my friends.

My mom was probably the biggest influence. She cooked dinner every night. We sat around the table every night. It was a very traditional family.

Most of our traditions revolved around the kitchen, and the thing that stands out to me is my mom makes Turducken. Most people think it's some kind of great myth in the world, but my mom makes it.

I'm not a trained chef. I'm a self-taught cook, and I want people to be like, 'Yo, I could do that! Maybe I didn't think to or maybe it seemed harder than it really is.'