For me, I am very much a champion of home cooking and home cooks.
Regrettably, people today don't watch many programs that actually teach people how to cook, so I agreed to do a competitive show that I think will provide inspiration.
My goal in 'Live to Cook' is to make great food more approachable for home cooks.
I'd like to see 'Top Chef: Amateur'. Sometimes we have an amateur chef on the show and they just can't cut it against the pros but there are some great stories there.
Young chefs, famous chefs, home cooks, and everyone who loves food and cooking-we all depend on Larousse Gastronomique. It is the only culinary encyclopedia that is always up-to-date.
Too many books are full of recipes that aren't doable at home. They are purely aspirational. They are quite frightening, even for me.
The range of ingredients available to home cooks has expanded dramatically. People are incorporating herbs and spices like lemongrass, smoked Mexican chile, sumac, and za'atar mix.
We in the media have been guilty about not doing a better job of making people understand how really simple cooking is. We've made everyone feel like they have to be a chef.
There are so many food shows, really beautiful ones, that exist to elevate professional cooking and professional chefs. But there aren't that many that really celebrate home cooking or are for home cooks especially.
'MasterChef' is the search for America's culinary amateur talent, so this is a search for the best home cook in America, and it's our job to figure out who that is.
There are so many things that come into writing a recipe, and it's really important if you're writing for home cooks to be cooking like you are at home.
I did a show a long, long time ago called 'Cooking Mexican'. It was a studio show as opposed to on-location like the one I do now. Before my first show, I was a cooking instructor, and I did a whole lot of classes for home cooks about Mexican food.
'MasterChef''s preliminary stages deliver just the right level of almost-drama for viewers feeling shagged out after a hard day's fruitless existence.
