Alvin Leung Quotes

I want to have Congolese influences but also influences from Dubai and Abu Dhabi and France. To mix everything up.

I'm a firm believer that the world should be your oyster when you're cooking. People should open themselves to other cuisines - there are a lot of hidden secrets all over the world.

The 'Maverick Chef' is one concept that I would really want to do again because I am traveling from country to country taking from what is in that country that is iconic, special, funky, weird and doing it my way. That is something I really enjoy.

I think that curiosity happened on these reviews where I was just a guest of the reviewer, because it introduced me to new cuisines and to the idea of cooking as a mechanism for studying other cultures and understanding other parts of the world.

I'm very inspired by other cultures and very often use what I perceive to be exotic ingredients.

I love food, all types of food. I love Korean food, Japanese, Italian, French. In Australia, we don't have a distinctive Australian food, so we have food from everywhere all around the world. We're very multicultural, so we grew up with lots of different types of food.

Miami is one of these places where diversity is in our blood, where, you know, if you want to go have a Nicaraguan breakfast, a Cuban lunch, and an American diner dinner, you do.

I think my heritage makes me very open to try things, taking on different flavours, mixing it all up. I find that exciting.

As a kid we would eat moussaka with mash. We had a real fusion of two cultures that no-one has dared to fuse since.

I just couldn't live without other cultures' cuisines.

I'm half Moroccan and half Indian so I have quite an adventurous taste in food.

Everywhere the sky is blue. There are a multitude of cuisines and dishes. I think of them as the languages and dialects of food.

The type of cuisine I do, especially after being on 'Iron Chef' for several years, is a lot of global cuisine. My strength has always been Mediterranean cuisine across the board from Morocco, Spain, Italy, Greece, France, but I think now I'm doing a lot of very different cuisines all the time.

It's fun to pick a cuisine and say I'm going to research Ethiopian food, and see what it's all about. You find that there are a lot of similarities in cuisines from around the world and a lot of similar flavors.

I had a long-lasting love affair with the flavors from Japan and the hustling New York street vendors. And, of course, a life-changing return to Ethiopia has made huge impacts on my life in food.

You eat a lot of goat stomach when you're in North Africa. You eat whatever's put in front of you. I am a big proponent of that.

Pasta isn't just for Italian food anymore. Now there are tasty pasta recipes found in Asian cuisine, and it's emerging as a newfound love for vegans.

Ultimately, I want to prepare food that will be recognized equally in Tokyo, London, and Paris. I am after that universality, that transcendence.

What makes Harlem special is that at any given time, food seekers can not only find food deeply rooted in Southern, Latin and African traditions, but also can taste the newer Senegalese, Chinese, and Italian influences as well.

The fact that over 50 per cent of the residents of Toronto are not from Canada, that is always a good thing, creatively, and for food especially. That is easily a city's biggest strength, and it is Toronto's unique strength.

In the States, you can buy Chinese food. In Beijing you can buy hamburger. It's very close. Now I feel the world become a big family, like a really big family. You have many neighbors. Not like before, two countries are far away.

I'm free to see things objectively because I don't consider myself American, and I don't consider myself British or Indian. I'm kind of an amalgam or mongrel of a lot of different places and experiences. In a lot of ways it's been a good thing for me. It's enabled me to do what I do on 'The Daily Show.'

Food culture is like listening to the Beatles - it's international, it's very positive, it's inventive and creative.

New York's food scene is truly unique because it is this wonderful melting pot where immigrants from all over the world have brought with them their cuisines and their ingredients.

It [being an immigrant] gave me a huge advantage. Being an immigrant is the best of both worlds. You’re programmed two different ways. You’re bringing the best from your culture—and Hispanic culture has so many great things—and mixing it with the greatest country in the world. That gives us an advantage in comparison to somebody who was born in the U.S., went to school here, and the U.S. is all they’ve seen. We’ve seen the other side.