I spent a college semester in a small town in Italy - and that is where I truly tasted food for the first time.
For me, I love the flavors of Southern food, and people usually think of Southern food as heavy and fattening, but it doesn't have to be.
For me, the food I like to make is the food I can enjoy all the time anytime. It's not too calculated or technical.
Comfort food is really anything you want at that time. That said, I really love Naple-style pizza.
Culinary tradition is not always based on fact. Sometimes it's based on history, on habits that come out of a time when kitchens were fueled by charcoal.
I hate to say 'chain restaurant,' but we're sort of a corporation now. How do we defy that concept, where people assume each restaurant can't be good?
A cake is a very good test of an oven: if it browns too much on one side and not on the other, it's not your fault - you need to have your oven checked.
California is lucky, the East Coast is lucky because we get great seafood and a lot of produce from Florida, locally in good weather, but in the winter we have to buy it.
I have a crusade against fondant, also shortening. There's no reason why wedding cakes can't taste good if you know what you're doing.
My biggest fear has always been being 40 and hating my job. I love challenges. I'm not afraid to try anything.
I've never found kicks to the groin particularly funny, although recent work in the genre of the buddy movie suggests audience research must prove me wrong.
I lived a normal life for a number of years. I had kids. I lived up on a farm in Gloucestershire in rural England, and just kind of got back to reality again.
I love to roast vegetables - carrots, fennel, and so on. I also love to mash or puree pretty much any vegetable!
I love hospitality, and I love cooking. The kitchen is where I feel most at ease and where I feel most like myself.
I don't think I have an obsession, however I do eat chocolate every day.
When you are 25, 30, you know, you have no responsibility, no mortgage, no kids, no retirement to think about, nothing.
I don't care if you're doing haute cuisine or burgers and pizza, just do it right.
Keeping your space clean is as much a part of the end result as the dish being tasty.
I always tell people a clean cooking area is a clean mind which is available for the creativity.
I believe that there are no mistakes in the universe, so I think it all happens as it should!
We all ended up jumping up and down, hugging each other when Ali won; cause Ali is the greatest.
