Mario Batali Quotes on Cooking (8 Quotes)

The ideas come from classic Italian cooking, or any European culture, for that matter. As far as something like the offal menu, Europeans would definitely not throw anything away, and the use of the head or the liver or the kidneys is part of their quotidian experience.

When I was a cook and 24 years old... I read the kinds of books that were the inspiration to understanding the value of simplicity in cooking.

They have what's called the cooking school bloc, which is in the afternoon between 1 and 5. It will be interesting to see how my show, which is travel and food tied together, goes across America.

The tradition of Italian cooking is that of the matriarch. This is the cooking of grandma. She didn't waste time thinking too much about the celery. She got the best celery she could and then she dealt with it.

I started to train in economics, and I hated it. I never really entered that world, and went to a cooking school in London. Since then I've been cooking in great places all over the world mostly California, Italy, and a little bit of France.

In growing up in Seattle, I don't know a single family that didn't barbecue or cook on the weekends and make its own kind of simple, pared-down, what I call Pacific Northwest cooking.

Cooking in France and Italy has a particular high resonance, and it's hard to say how or why it developed other than that they've been smarter and there longer.

Think of the cooking of the Southwest Arizona, anything on the border of Mexico, the rich chili culture, the unbelievable stews.