Culinary Adaptation Quotes

I think there is a real misconception about Indian food being super spicy. And I know that's because when you go into an Indian restaurant, it is pretty spicy. But it doesn't have to be. In fact, my husband can't handle a lot of heat. I've had to temper my cooking so that he can eat with me.

The first weeks in the US, I was asking, ‘Where is my food?’

I believe everything is about balance. I'm not 100% vegan, and obviously my fiance and my friends are not vegan, so I have to come up with a menu that will satisfy everybody.

If you eat caviar every day it's difficult to return to sausages.

You have to respect the culture you are cooking in, yes, but you have to respect the palate you are cooking for, too, and you have to adjust to that palate.

You know, this is really a way of cooking. It's not my way. I'm deeply influenced by the Mediterranean way of being. I've spent a lot of time there. And I've sort of translated it; I've tried to make it available to people in this country to whom it might not be familiar.

Taste is acquired. You may have to unlearn a taste for chocolate or ice cream.

After my pregnancy, I discovered I have an allergy to yeast. Problem is, all the food I love has yeast in it. So I have to relearn how to cook.

In each restaurant, I develop a different culinary sensibility. In Paris, I'm more classic, because that's what customers like. In Monaco, it's classic Mediterranean haute cuisine. In London, it's a contemporary French restaurant that I've developed with a U.K. influence and my French know-how.

In my early days, I copied the great French chefs, like most chefs do. Copying is not bad. Copying and not recognizing that you are copying is bad. For me, when I go to a restaurant and am served a dish influenced by something we created at elBulli, if it's well done, it makes me extremely happy.

In certain European cuisines, vegetables are cooked a long time. I take the term 'al dente' and use it for vegetables.

Half of the receipts in our cookbooks are mere murder to such constitutions and stomachs as we grow here. ...in America, owing to our brighter skies and more fervid climate, we have developed an acute, nervous delicacy of temperament far more akin to that of France than of England.

I am not very convinced with having a signature dish. The whole point of being a chef is going to a new place, adapting and curating a new menu as per the culture and community.

Just because it tastes good in Hong Kong, it doesn't necessarily translate elsewhere.

People think of fortune cookies as being Chinese, but in essence, they are fundamentally American.

I can be much more creative with my menus in the casino cities. In New York, there are certain things I can't make. In Las Vegas, they're much more receptive. Rabbit, some seafoods - they won't necessarily do well in New York, but I'll try them in Las Vegas, and they'll be a success.

Nobody ought to be too old to improve: I should be sorry if I was; and I flatter myself I have already improved considerably by my travels. First, I can swallow gruel soup, egg soup, and all manner of soups, without making faces much. Secondly, I can pretty well live without tea.

Culture and tradition have to change little by little. So 'new' means a little twist, a marriage of Japanese technique with French ingredients. My technique. Indian food, Korean food; I put Italian mozzarella cheese with sashimi. I don't think 'new new new.' I'm not a genius. A little twist.

When I decided to become vegetarian, I had to learn how to 'recook,' if you will. For example, I used to put red wine in a big pot with the meat that I'd cooked in fat, and it was, of course, delicious. When I gave up meat, I wondered what I would make. That turned out to be vegetables, really organic and fresh.