Ann Mah > Quotes

“There was no experience, I thought, quite as wonderful as being an American in Paris.”
― Ann Mah, Mastering the Art of French Eating: Lessons in Food and Love from a Year in Paris

“I had spent enough time in France to know that the words 'chez moi' meant something a thousand times more profound than one's current home. 'Chez moi' was the place your parents came from, or maybe even the region of your parents' parents. The food you ate at Christmas, your favorite kind of cheese, your best childhood memories of summer vacation -- all of these derived from 'chez moi.' And even if you had never lived there, 'chez moi' was knitted into your identity; it colored the way you viewed the world and the way the world viewed you.”
― Ann Mah, The Lost Vintage

“Around ten o'clock, we left for the train station, pressing upon the Wagners the little gifts we'd brought--chocolate and cigarettes, bars of soap, and packets of dried fruits--exchanging addresses and promising to write even though we knew we wouldn't. It was one of the great joys of travel, these fleeting exchanges and ephemeral friendships, the way people you met abroad would forever linger in your memories of a place.”
― Ann Mah, Jacqueline in Paris

“In France dining is meant to be a special, pleasurable part of the day; food offers not only fuel for the body but also a connection—between the people who have joined you at the table, between the generations who have shared a recipe, between the terroir (the earth) and the culture and cuisine that have sprung from it. Separate from cooking, the very act of eating is in itself an art to master.”
― Ann Mah, Mastering the Art of French Eating: Lessons in Food and Love from a Year in Paris

“I’ve always felt there are two states of existence: being in Paris and being out of it.”
― Ann Mah, Mastering the Art of French Eating: Lessons in Food and Love from a Year in Paris

“...I wondered if I would very stop missing Paris, if I could ever stop aching for its smells, its states, its splendors...Perhaps this was the great love of my life...I've never stopped dreaming of it, never stopped reading French history and novels, watching French films, or devouring French culture--art and fashion and food--never stopped turning to it for inspiration and refuge. In so many ways, it has sustained me.”
― Ann Mah, Jacqueline in Paris

“But though the pursuit of pleasure was encouraged, ambition was considered unseemly. Hard work had to be hidden, and success needed to appear effortless, even accidental. It”
― Ann Mah, The Lost Vintage

“Humans are sentimental creatures, n’est ce pas?” she said. “We gather mementos to help us recall happy occasions, moments of delight - to remind us of the innocence that exists in the world. My husband used to tease me for hoarding all these bits and pieces. But now I find they’re like a museum of comfort.”
― Ann Mah, Jacqueline in Paris

“They say there are as many recipes for crêpes in Bretagne as there are people who make them,”
― Ann Mah, Mastering the Art of French Eating: Lessons in Food and Love from a Year in Paris

“I had come to France to discover the place that had existed for so long in my imagination - and in many ways, I had. But I hadn't understood there were other lessons to be learned so far from home: that overseas I was not only a visitor but a guest; not only a student but an envoy; not only an observer but also the observed.”
― Ann Mah, Jacqueline in Paris: A Novel

“Sometimes, I thought, living in Paris was like living in a museum—beautiful and poignant and untouched by time.”
― Ann Mah, Mastering the Art of French Eating: Lessons in Food and Love from a Year in Paris

“Instead, we have simply readjusted our limits of tolerance.”
― Ann Mah, The Lost Vintage

“Liberté. The word could have so many different interpretations: Freedom from oppression. Freedom from the past. Freedom to stand up to injustice. To remain and fight for one’s values was surely as important a legacy as the terroir itself.”
― Ann Mah, The Lost Vintage

“The wine sleeps in the bottle, but still it is changing—evolving,” Jean-Luc had told us. “And when the cork is removed, it breathes again, and comes awake. Like a fairy tale. Un conte de fées.”
― Ann Mah, The Lost Vintage

“...I wondered if I would ever stop missing Paris, if I could ever stop aching for its smells, and states, and splendors. Perhaps this was the great first love of my life...”
― Ann Mah, Jacqueline in Paris

“Of course, it still sailed next to me, that parallel life—it would always sail next to me—as full of joy and challenge as the one I was living. I thought of it sometimes, pale and chilled—lit by a satellite moon, not the sun of reality—a ghostly ship charting a route to what might have been, while I remained on the course of what was. *”
― Ann Mah, Mastering the Art of French Eating: Lessons in Food and Love from a Year in Paris

“Now, I was unemployed in Beijing, and my former ambition seemed like the pollution that smudged the sky, a great green cloud composed of a billion different particles of fear and uncertainty. Without a career I hardly knew who I was anymore.”
― Ann Mah, Mastering the Art of French Eating: Lessons in Food and Love from a Year in Paris

“At this point, my “chez moi” was more a space within myself—the dreams and ambitions that I carried with me—rather than any tangible place.”
― Ann Mah, The Lost Vintage

“Without love, my work felt a bit meaningless; just as when I cooked for myself -- the food never tasted as good.”
― Ann Mah, Mastering the Art of French Eating: Lessons in Food and Love from a Year in Paris

“When you love someone, you want to share with that person the things you enjoy most in the world.”
― Ann Mah, Mastering the Art of French Eating: Lessons in Food and Love from a Year in Paris

“In 1944 the Confrérie established the Château du Clos de Vougeot as their headquarters, restoring it and in fact improving upon its former austerity, creating luxurious banquet rooms where monks had once lived in spartan simplicity. (In the monks’ former dining room, re-created as part of the château’s museum, long wooden tables, benches, and a pulpit hinted at their austere lifestyle; one brother would read passages from the Bible as the others ate gruel in enforced silence.)”
― Ann Mah, Mastering the Art of French Eating: Lessons in Food and Love from a Year in Paris

“And yet each move was a stark reminder of the things that couldn't be packed into boxes and sent on a transport ship: contacts, friends, inspiration, the daily routine that was my life.”
― Ann Mah, Mastering the Art of French Eating: Lessons in Food and Love from a Year in Paris

“It was one of the great joys of travel, these fleeting exchanges and ephemeral friendships, the way people you met abroad would forever linger in your memories of a place.”
― Ann Mah, Jacqueline in Paris

“party—Claire only had one attendant, her pale roommate from law school, Kate Addison, who took one look at the whole roast suckling pig and spent the rest of the day slugging Johnnie Walker Red in a deep state of culture shock—but”
― Ann Mah, Kitchen Chinese

“wonder if this war could actually be a form of alchemy—changing us, testing us, until each of us has revealed the truest part of our souls.”
― Ann Mah, The Lost Vintage

“I wondered if Julia ever dreamed of a house, a place that didn't get packed and unpacked every thirty-six months, a place where she knew every creak of the floorboards, where she could reach for the kettle and make a cup of tea without turning on the kitchen lights, where the children she never had left small, muddy footprints in the hallway, a place drifting with the happy ghosts of countless meals cooked by her own hands. A permanent place. A home.”
― Ann Mah, Mastering the Art of French Eating: Lessons in Food and Love from a Year in Paris

“Insomnia. It was like a foreign movie I never wanted to see, filled with dark images that ran on an incessant loop through my exhausted brain.”
― Ann Mah, Mastering the Art of French Eating: Lessons in Food and Love from a Year in Paris

“this is the only place I’ve ever lived. Know what I mean? How will I ever grow up if I don’t leave?”
― Ann Mah, The Lost Vintage

“But I cherished the moments I spent alone, lost in a book, or, more often, my dreams and imagination. More than anything else, they sustained me.”
― Ann Mah, Jacqueline in Paris

“But thinking of Julia reminded me of the important things in life: the essential humanness of sharing good food with the people you love, even when you may be in a place you don't love very much. Somehow everything tastes better eaten with your favorite dining companion. I looked up at Julia in her kitchen on rue de Loo. I hoped she would keep an eye on things until I returned.”
― Ann Mah, Mastering the Art of French Eating: Lessons in Food and Love from a Year in Paris