Quotes About Cooking

Anthimus's pronouncement on garum has echoed through Western cooking: "Nam liquamen ex omni parte prohibemus," We ban the use of garum from every culinary role.

The leading articulator of this rich diet, the last preindustrial British cuisine, was Hannah Glasse, whose books were so popular that Dr. Johnson claimed there was no such person and Hannah Glasse must be the nom de plume of a man. But Hannah did exist, she was a woman, and she cooked with endless quantities of cream and butter.

Boil 15 large potatoes in jackets. When done peel and rice them, letting them cool about 5 minutes, then add 2 eggs, 1½ cups of flour, 1 teaspoon salt and roll into balls and roll balls in flour. Have a pot of boiling water on the fire, place the dumplings in the water that has been salted and boil for 10 minutes, remove and serve. Hasenpfeffer and Kartoffel Klösze are generally served together but either can be served separate or with other food.

This one is from the 1851 edition of Miss Leslie's Directions for Cookery: BROILED SALMON Split the salmon and take out the bones as nicely as possible without mangling the flesh. Then cut it into filets or steaks about an inch thick. Dry them lightly in a cloth and dredge them in flour. Take care not to squeeze or press them. Have ready some clear, bright, coals, such as are

An unhappily married woman is necessarily a bad cook.

for my wife," she didn't raise an eyebrow but went immediately to her cupboards and pointed out ingredients. Benny noted it all on brown butcher paper as Mrs Mahmoud mimed the whole process, including the imprinting of a cross on the

The way you make an omelet reveals your character.

At the base of my right forefinger is an inch-and-a-half diagonal callus, yellowish-brown in color, where the heels of all the knives I've ever owned have rested, the skin softened by constant immersion in water. It distinguishes me immediately as a cook, as someone who's been on the job a long time. You can feel it when I shake my hand, just as I feel it on others of my profession. It's a secret sign, a sort of Masonic handshake without the silliness.

Perhaps omelet skills should be learned at the same time you learn to fuck.

And chicken is boring. Chefs see it as a menu item for people who don't know what they want to eat.

I'm asked a lot what the best thing about cooking for a living is. And it's this: to be a part of a subculture. To be part of a historical continuum, a secret society with its own language and customs. To enjoy the instant gratification of making something good with one's hands--using all one's senses. It can be, at times, the purest and most unselfish way of giving pleasure (thought oral sex has to be a close second).

Everyone should be encouraged at every turn to develop their own modest yet unique repertoire—to find a few dishes they love and practice at preparing them until they are proud of the result. To either respect in this way their own past—or express through cooking their dreams for the future. Every citizen would thus have their own specialty. Why can we not do this? There is no reason in the world. Let us then go forward. With vigor.

Too lazy to peel fresh? You don't deserve to eat garlic.

A proper saute pan, for instance, should cause serious head injury if brought down hard against someone's skull. If you have any doubts about which will dent — the victim's head or your pan — then throw that pan right in the trash.

For me, the cooking life has been a long love affair, with moments both sublime and ridiculous. But like a love affair, looking back you remember the happy times best —

Toast your goddamn muffins.

This book is about street-level cooking and its practitioners. Line cooks are the heroes.

I believe the words "meat" and "treated with ammonia" should never occur in the same paragraph—much less the same sentence. Unless you're talking about surreptitiously disposing of a corpse.

I know how old most seafood is on Monday — about four to five days old!

I like cooking pasta. Maybe it's that I always wanted to be Italian American in some dark part of my soul; maybe I get off on that final squirt of emulsifying extra virgin, just after the basil goes in, I don't know.

I make two cook like you in the toilette each morning! You are deezgusting!

They'd been running households for years, of course – seeing to the finances, cooking, cleaning, weaving, and in general, doing all those things which men couldn't, or more accurately, wouldn't, do.

Life without stock is barely worth living, and you will never attain demi-glace without

like slicing bread, thick-skinned tomatoes and so on — but on your full line of vegetables, spuds, meat and even fish. My sous-chef uses his for just about everything. F. Dick makes a good one for about twenty-five bucks.