“Protein was the most valued ingredient 250 years ago: It was the rares...” — Adam Gopnik Quote

Protein was the most valued ingredient 250 years ago: It was the rarest thing. Now the rarest thing we have is time: time to cook and time to eat.

There are as many attitudes to cooking as there are people cooking, of course, but I do think that cooking guys tend - I am a guilty party here - to take, or get, undue credit for domestic virtue, when in truth cooking is the most painless and, in its ways, ostentatious of the domestic chores.

Going to a restaurant is one of my keenest pleasures. Meeting someplace with old and new friends, ordering wine, eating food, surrounded by strangers, I think is the core of what it means to live a civilised life.

Cooking is the showy side of domesticity.

Take the time to shop for yourself and cook. All of this is an investment in yourself, and if you're not going to invest time and money in what you put in your body, then what are you going to spend money on? It's kind of the most important thing.

I can cook, but I also want everything to look beautiful on the plate - then I get upset when people eat it. Everyone just tears through it, and that makes me sad. It's not a rewarding experience for me to cook.

A good cook is like a sorceress who dispenses happiness.

I think every young cook wants to write a book.

I come from a long line of women that cook. I love it, I grew up with it.