Innovative Cooking Quotes

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.

What has impressed me the most about the Italians whose tables we've sat at is that they are traditional cooks but also outrageously innovative. These people are wild improvisers.

The role of a chef isn't to reinvent dishes but to tweak.

When I walk into a market I may see a different cut of meat or an unusual vegetable and think, ‘I wonder how it would be if I took the recipe for that sauce I had in Provence and put the two together?’ So I go home and try it out. Sometimes my idea is a success and sometimes it is a flop, but that is how recipes are born. There really are not recipes, only millions of variations sparked by someone’s imagination and desire to be a little creative and different. American cooking is built, after all, on variations of old recipes from around the world.

I’m going to break one of the rules of the trade here. I’m going to tell you some of the secrets of improvisation. Just remember—it’s always a good idea to follow the directions exactly the first time you try a recipe. But from then on, you’re on your own.

It is critical to have a sound understanding of traditional culinary principles before attempting to push boundaries in cuisine. Larousse Gastronomique helps me execute the progressive cooking we do at Alinea.

It turns out that Molly wasn't her mother's daughter in that respect. Charity was like the MacGuyver of the kitchen. She could whip up a five-course meal for twelve from an egg, two spaghetti noodles, some household chemicals, and a stick of chewing gum. Molly ... Molly once burned my egg. My boiled egg. I don't know how.

I have to be honest and say that I never really feel like there's one person that I really want to cook for. I just want my food to always get better and always be evolving and for there to always be movement in what I make. I would say I strive for that more than anything else.

We hand the meat over to Greasy Sae in the kitchen. She likes District 13 well enough, even though she thinks the cooks are somewhat lacking in imagination. But a woman who came up with a palatable wild dog and rhubarb stew is bound to feel as if her hands are tied here.

North America was ready for something other than a vanilla cooking show and we were providing the double dark chocolate fudge.

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.

You can't please everyone, especially if you're doing very radical things at the vanguard of cooking. That's life; it's a polemic I've lived with since I started cooking.

There's a freshness to the approach of teen chefs. They're lighthearted, and they're not afraid to take risks.

[Molecular gastronomy] was a great trend, because it experimented with food. The benchmark was [former elBulli head chef] Ferran Adrià, and now he is no longer there it is harder to gauge.

When we first did 'Modernist Cuisine,' I think most people in cookbook publishing would have said, 'This is insane.'

There's nobody you can call and say, 'So, can you maybe send me your formula for frying Hollandaise?' because to the best of my knowledge, it didn't exist before we did it.

I am classically trained in French pastry, but I am American and have a natural curiosity and playfulness that comes through in my cooking. I like to present flavors that people are familiar with in unique combinations and forms that may surprise them.

Then Maura made something with butter and Calla made something with bacon and Blue steamed broccoli in self-defense.

Cooking is like fashion. Always, I like to try to change. If I'm traveling in a different country - to Australia, the Bahamas, Budapest, Moscow - and I see a new ingredient, I like to try it in a new dish.