Chef Identity Quotes

Chefs aren't celebrities: they're chefs.

Being a cook doesn't necessarily mean you are a competitor.

Before any exposure on TV, I'm a real chef.

I've never said I was a chef - I think I make great food. I will never open a restaurant to do, like, tasting courses.

The design of a restaurant should embrace the identity of the chef, the nature of the cuisine, and the context of the restaurant itself.

I'm not a TV guy. I'm a restaurant chef and a businessman.

I'm not a celebrity chef. I'm a chef that happens to have television shows and a chef that happens to do media.

I do most of the cooking at home, and both my mom and my mother-in-law are excellent chefs. However, I wouldn't call myself a chef.

I came to understand that the words executive and corporate never belong next to the word chef.

I had turned down other head chef jobs. I didn't want to take over someone else's cuisine. I wanted to start from scratch.

I am a chef through and through. Everything I do - whether it is cooking for kids in Harlem or cooking in a fine dining establishment - all my days are consumed by food.

I want to be a chef, but I'm only a fat girl chef; like, I only like to make fat comfort food. I'm not, like, a healthy chef person.

Nine out of ten English chefs have their names on their chests. Who do they think they are? They're dreamers. They're jokes. Just ask yourself how many chefs in this country have Michelin stars and how many have their names on their jackets. We all wear blue aprons in my kitchen because we're all commis. We're all still learning.

I get so tickled when that pilot happens to be an African American because I rarely see that. The same is true when I go to find restaurants. I mean, most places I go, I kind of have some idea who the chef is, which is why I want to go.

Many chefs of a certain caliber do not see me as a chef. I don't have a restaurant. They see me as a TV food personality, not a chef. I've gotten respect, trust me, they respect me, but I think that I can't hit that particular level of respect from them until I have a successful Vegas restaurant that not only makes money but creates unbelievable food and a fabulous experience. I don't think people think I can cook, and they don't think I know what the hell I'm doing.

The idea of old was to conform yourself to a style of cooking, it was not to create a style of cooking. Now the chef is so much into 'I want to sign that dish and say I am the one who made that dish.'

Between the ages of six and nine, my palette was taking shape as well as my identity as a chef. It was then that I learned the difference between salty, sweet, sour and even spicy.

A lot of people call me a celebrity chef, but I don't think that I'm a celebrity. So I want to stay keeping just a chef. That's more comfortable.

Chefs have always been leaders, but now, because of social media and the evolution of the chef identity, we have a voice that expands beyond cooking.

Taking dishes straight off the restaurant's menu and putting them into a cookbook doesn't work, because as a chef you have your own vision of what your food is, but you can't always explain it. Or you can't pick recipes that best illustrate who and where you are and what you're doing. And if the recipes don't work, you don't have a book.

Chefs don't become chefs just to earn stars - that's not the goal.

Nine out of 10 English chefs have their names on their chests. Who do they think they are? They're dreamers. They're jokes.