Food Preparation Quotes

“Food prepared with a light heart and in a happy frame of mind is often the best food. Preparing the special foods that are favorites of those you love... making just a little effort to garnish the salad with a sprig of parsley, a bit of grated cheese, or a wild strawberry from the nearby meadow. This says "you cared enough to do the little extra things." This makes cooking pleasant and satisfying. Make the food look as pretty as it is good to eat.
-Betty Crocker's Picture Cook Book, revised and enlarged (1956)”
― Karma Brown, Recipe for a Perfect Wife

“I go to the larder for the quinces and stop in amazement. For the larder is brimming over with food. Baskets of field mushrooms. Trugs of green apples and yellow pears. A metal bath containing two pink crabs. Slabs of newly churned butter as bright as a dandelion flower. Wheels of pale yellow cheese the size of my head. An earthenware bowl of cobnuts. A ham soaking in a pail of water.”
― Annabel Abbs, Miss Eliza's English Kitchen

“Remember that the first thing anyone does is eat with their eyes. Before the diner even takes a single bite, what they see, hear, and smell is what will often entice them to eat---or to partake of some other dish if they have the opportunity. For the ultimate, transcendent food experience, the mind must be engaged on multiple levels.”
― Jennieke Cohen, My Fine Fellow

“She picked up salted butter, thick Greek yoghurt, and cream.
The menu was not modest. Her basket was already heavy with Charlotte potatoes, fresh herbs, and a Duchy chicken.
It was too hot for a roast chicken, but Piglet had once heard Nigella say something about a house only being home once a chicken was in the oven. And anyway, there would be salads: one chopped and scattered with feta and sumac, another leafy with soft herbs. New potatoes, boiled and dotted with a bright salsa verde. Bread and two types of butter: confit and Parmesan and black pepper.”
― Lottie Hazell, Piglet

“There's something special about plating a dish for the first time. Making something in real life match what was in your mind's eye. I see one of those long, rectangular platters with three separate compartments. The colors are almost exactly what I was envisioning. The darkness of the sesame crust and the ponzu in the first one, contrasted with the bright green cucumber beneath and the bright red sauce on top. The cauliflower-thyme puree in the middle dish, perfectly off-white and flecked with green, the orange Cajun exterior, the drizzle of lemon oil over all of it. And the taco. The perfect spice of the aioli, the cilantro smelling like home.”
― Adi Alsaid, North of Happy

“Elijah had roasted duck confit legs in toasted, ground coriander, cumin, and chili; he'd paired it with a strawberry and pink peppercorn gastrique sauce drizzled overtop and dotted on the platter. He'd baked walnut, ramp, and queso fresco financiers in small round molds and topped each of them with a strawberry flower. He'd colored more of his homemade queso fresco---one of Penelope's recipes---with beet powder, which he'd molded into spheres, dotted with nigella seeds, and topped with strawberry stems to approximate the look of strawberries while adding a creamy element to the dish. To punctuate the strawberry-patch appearance further and add another contrast, he'd scattered pickled half-ripe strawberry cubes, more strawberry blossoms, and tiny, fragrant yellow and red alpine strawberries across the plate. Shards of sumptuous, crispy duck skin finished the plate.”
― Jennieke Cohen, My Fine Fellow

“The word gochisō not only means "feast," but also...
... "to run" or "rush." The host rushes around to gather the ingredients, get them ready, and then cook the food.
The vegetables and chicken were homegrown...
... and you must have sought out the halfbeak and quail yourself.
Miyasato sensei expended a lot of time and effort to treat us to this meal.
The dishes we had are all common ones so that we'd easily be able to compare them with versions we've eaten before.
For the wakame and green onion with miso, you pulled the onions out of your own vegetable patch, and you also used fresh wakame and homemade miso.
And that's why it tasted so much better than usual.
The care you've put into getting all these dishes ready...
... is what made this a real gochisō.”
― Tetsu Kariya, Japanese Cuisine

“It's eight, and it's time to prepare the filet mignons encrusted with pepper, sliced and served with an Israeli couscous salad with almonds, feta cheese, cherry tomatoes, roasted red peppers, preserved lemons, braised fennel, and artichoke bottoms. Funny, when I'd first made this meal for Caro, she didn't believe me when I'd presented the fine or medium grains at Moroccan or Algerian restaurants. Regardless of the name, Israeli couscous is more pasta-like and not crushed, but delicious all the same, and I love the texture---especially when making a Mediterranean-infused creation that celebrates the flavors of both spring and summer.
While Oded preps the salad, I sear the steaks, and an aroma hits my nostrils---more potent than pepper---with a hint of floral notes, hazelnut, and citrus. I don't think anything of it, because my recipe is made up from a mix of many varieties of peppercorns---black, green, white, red, and pink. Maybe I'd added in a fruitier green?”
― Samantha Verant, The Spice Master at Bistro Exotique

“Documenting what I do in the kitchen can feel like the task of recording almost nothing. But it is the nothing I am doing, and do almost every day, and have been doing every day for over a decade. It is the nothing that has been part of almost every social interaction of my life as an adult and through which I have come to know almost all the people I love. It is the nothing through which I have been sustained and transformed.”
― Rebecca May Johnson, Small Fires: An Epic in the Kitchen

“A dinner party would not be satisfied with ices and rice puddings. I tried to think what Mr Roland would have done. At least an impressive gateau. I thumbed through the cookery books. Mille-feuilles cake à la chantilly. Yes, I could do that. I could always guarantee that pastry would turn out well. And oranges were abundant here. An orange cream served in orange shells? That seemed doable, too. And for a third? I thought of a bread and butter pudding, to remind them of home, but alas we had no stale bread. This was one of the disadvantages of being in someone else's kitchen. So I decided I couldn't go wrong with profiteroles- who doesn't like them?”
― Rhys Bowen, Above the Bay of Angels

“Last night I baked the Jewish apple cakes, and each one came out moist and fragrant and dense, bursting with apples I caramelized with Calvados and a touch of rosemary and then folded into a vanilla-and-cinnamon-scented cake. We braised the brisket in a tomato sauce so rich and garlicky I can still smell it on my fingers, and the honey ice cream came out silky smooth and tastes like a spoonful of creamy honey, with crunchy chunks of honeycomb toffee.”
― Dana Bate, The Girls' Guide to Love and Supper Clubs

“Every step, every stage and every layer of every ingredient matters to us at Tres Amigos Grill.”
― John Kresl

“She had already tied on her apron and started tapping notes into her phone as Daisy laid out the ingredients: a whole kosher chicken; a bottle of olive oil, a pound of butter, a lemon. Onions, garlic, shallots, shiitake mushrooms, Parmesan cheese, and a container of arborio rice; fresh rosemary and thyme, a bag of carrots, a half-pound of asparagus, and a half-pound of sugar snap peas. That was for dinner. For pantry staples, she'd gotten flour, white and brown sugar, kosher salt and Maldon salt, pepper, chili, and paprika; for the refrigerator: milk, eggs, and half-and-half, and, for a housewarming gift, a copy of Ruth Reichl's My Kitchen Year and two quarts of her own homemade chicken stock.”
― Jennifer Weiner, That Summer

“The caterer would like to use your sideboard buffet for the skull platters, raven plates, and broomstick-style forks. The florist will provide a bouquet of black roses. The cauldron punch and batwing cups will go on the dining room table."
"Menu?" Amelia requested. "We'd discussed finger food last week. What did you finally decide?"
Grace ticked off the items. "All the food is easy to eat while standing," she assured Amelia. "Chicken-witch fingers, miniature goblin burgers, chocolate crescent witch hats, ghost sugar cookies, pumpkin Bundt cake, sliced caramel apples, small popcorn balls, and a big bowl of candy corn.”
― Kate Angell, The Cottage on Pumpkin and Vine

“Mom, I think you've done enough experimenting. All of these batches have been delicious."
I dip the other, unbitten end into a small dish of sweet chili sauce.
"You never know what people will want," she says. "Some like it with pork, some like it with chicken, some like it with shrimp."
Our post-work evening has been spent testing out different batches of lumpia for the upcoming Maui Food Festival. Ever since I told her we'd be competing to keep our spot on Makena Road, she's been in a food-prepping frenzy. Every night after work for the past week she's spent hours testing out new dishes, tweaking ingredients to get the flavors just right. Yesterday it was adjusting the level of fish sauce in the pansit, then attempting to perfect the ratio of rice noodle to meat and vegetables.”
― Sarah Smith, Simmer Down

“I assembled the breakfast while Sam set up the coffee urns. I arranged one platter beautifully, with peach rolls, apple cider doughnuts, mixed fruit turnovers, and healthy slices of cinnamon streusel coffee cake. On the other, breakfast burritos---Eddie's favorite---mini spinach and crab quiches, and bagels with smoked salmon, cream cheese, and chives.”
― Kate Young, Southern Sass and a Crispy Corpse

“For the meeting, I'd laid out a wide variety of fillings and sauces on the table, with the sauces in my antique chafing dishes to stay warm. And it was true---there was a lot of food. I'd provided prosciutto, roasted red peppers, toasted walnuts, fig preserves, and a cheese sauce made with fontina. The savory ingredients were intended for the brown-butter buckwheat crepes.
For dessert, I'd provided sweet crepes made with my grandmother's recipe. Antique china bowls containing Nutella, sweetened mascarpone, lemon curd, and sliced fresh fruit fought for space on the table.
The crepe I was most proud of, though, was my stracciatella crepe. In a nod to the gelato flavor, I'd attacked the chocolate bar with my trusty Microplane zester and incorporated it as a last ingredient in my chilled crepe batter.”
― Hillary Manton Lodge, A Table by the Window

“Kenny. You've got the Moroccan carrot salad done, but where are we with the brussels sprouts?"
"Everything is prepped. We just need the sprouts."
"Good. Go ahead and start caramelizing the onions for the goat-cheese toasts, and then get the bacon going---just be sure to undercook the bacon. It'll cook the rest of the way in the oven."
"Yes, chef."
"Clementine, can you take over the grilled crudités? We need to get them chilled by five."
She nodded. "Yes, chef."
"Excellent. I'll start prepping the butternut-squash fritters," I said, rolling up my sleeves. "And then the mozzarella poppers. Let's get to work."



I was elbows deep in fried mozzarella and crispy-edged butternut-squash fritters when my brother and boyfriend finally arrived, wet and bedraggled, at the kitchen door.
"I have dates," Nico said, holding the crate aloft. "Dates and brussels sprouts."
"It's about time," I shot back. "You've been single far too long."
"I'm going to get cleaned up," he said, "and then I can relieve you."
"Take your time," I replied honestly. "I've got everything under control."
And I did. The fritters were done and in the warming oven with a cake pan full of water in the rack below to keep them from drying out. I'd made up the mozzarella poppers by breading the rounds of buffalo-milk mozzarella with batter and panko crumbs before deep-frying them in batches.
It had felt good to work with my hands again, good to do something other than managerial work. I cast a longing eye at Clementine's pavlovas, the baked egg whites topped with quartered figs. There was something soothing about working with egg whites, the frothy pure-white shade they became when whisked.”
― Hillary Manton Lodge, Together at the Table

“So, dinner for thirty-five, forty people. Dagou flips through his notebook. All of his earlier plans now are meager and uninteresting, except for the fresh ducks brining in the refrigerator. Brenda has never eaten Peking duck. He imagines her biting into the finest, most crackling chestnut skin. Enjoying, in addition, a few banquet plates to keep it company. Cold chicken, and the hollow-hearted greens. Plus the stew he promised Winnie. And chicken. He's already reserved the chicken, but his mother believes in combining flavors, she believes in many meats. He has promised her seafood---he can go to the seafood truck. For shrimp to accompany. There must be a shrimp dish---shrimp with mounds of diced ginger and scallions, or salted shrimp in the shell---or both, perhaps. Also, a second seafood dish. To serve only shrimp would be petty and small. Shrimp themselves, so very small. What else? Fish, of course---he's been planning to have fish all along. Soft-shell crab? He imagines how Brenda will glow when he serves platter after platter of soft-shell crab. Of course, she's never tasted it---he knows this because every bit of Chinese food she's ever eaten came from his own hands. He imagines her crunching through the crisp shell.”
― Lan Samantha Chang, The Family Chao

“Is dessert okay? Maybe some kind of bread pudding with homemade ice cream---simple, but hearty and good?"
We all nodded. "I'd like to do a raw fish appetizer," said Bald Joe. "Maybe a crudo with hamachi?"
"And I'd like to do an entrée," Vanilla Joe said. "A beef dish. Which means our other entrée should probably be seafood."
I nodded. "I can do a slow-cooked black bass." We'd done one at the Green Onion that I loved. It had a preserved tomato broth and cauliflower and a pile of nutty grains. I could do farro.
That left Bald Joe and me to divide another appetizer and a dessert between us. "I can do a dessert," I offered, thinking about a deconstructed baklava, but Vanilla Joe shook his head.
"No. Joe here is already doing one appetizer; we can't make him do two. He'll get overwhelmed."
"I really don't mind," said Bald Joe. "As long as Sadie helps me put everything together. I'd rather do an appetizer. I'm not great at pastry."
Vanilla Joe shook his head before I could speak up and say of course I would help. "Joe, I want you doing a dessert, so Sadie, you pick an appetizer."
Fine. Whatever. I hashed it out with the rest of the team, decided I would make a sunchoke soup with bacon and thyme. Vanilla Joe squinted at me. "I didn't think bacon was kosher."
"I don't cook kosher food," I explained patiently. I actually didn't mind; I was used to it. Kosher cooking had a long list of rules: no pork, no shellfish, no combining meat and dairy, among many others. Grandma Ruth had kept kosher, and I had total respect for everyone who did, but it wasn't me.”
― Amanda Elliot, Sadie on a Plate

“Multiple plates full of colorful elements stared back at him. Beet-cured salmon sliced thinly, sitting atop Andean purple potatoes made into a crispy cake, crowned with a tiny salad of arugula, edible flowers, and passion-fruit-pickled shallot rings, which could all be picked up and eaten in one bite, was his nod to both the South American flavors Penelope had been teaching him and his own Jewish traditions. Next he'd created a Lapsang souchong tea-smoked pigeon breast with a tamarind sauce in a flaky, herbed pastry cup (a refined version of one of his pasties), and for dessert, a chili and cinnamon-infused chocolate bon bon filled with a horchata liquid caramel.”
― Jennieke Cohen, My Fine Fellow

“It was the kind of feast she loved to fix. She made her falling-apart-tender ribs, smoked on the way-too-fancy patio barbecue and finished in a slow oven. She prepared three kinds of sauce and her very best sides---homemade cornbread with pepper jelly, plates of slow-simmered greens in pot liquor, and a salad of heirloom tomatoes and grilled peaches and herbs from the local farmers’ market, topped with a scoop of burrata cheese. Hummingbird cake for dessert, because who didn't like a hummingbird cake?”
― Susan Wiggs, Sugar and Salt

“I spend the day finalizing the seed bread and also making a variation with dried sour cherries, which add a lovely sweet-and-sour tang and yield a loaf that would be equally delicious topped with cheese or slathered in fresh jam. Since both loaves will keep for up to a week in the refrigerator, I leave half of each in Natasha's fridge and decide I'll take the rest home with me. In my head, I'm already concocting uses for both: a smoked trout spread for the plain version, and a whipped vanilla-bean ricotta for the one with cherries.”
― Dana Bate, Too Many Cooks

“A cannibal is food to another cannibal.”
― Tamerlan Kuzgov

“I saw exactly how they'd ordered the burger and the fish and noticed that they'd asked for mayo.
Violet came back into the kitchen. "Maggie, we just had a ten-top walk in. Are you ready for this?"
"Yes, I got it. Don't worry, it's all under control," I replied. "Alice, let's cut up the rest of that fresh basil, we are going to make an herb mayo. Ben, I need you to tell me where everything is."
The next few minutes were a bit of a blur. Ben gave me the ins and outs and Alice whipped up a yummy aioli. We decided to add it on the side of each burger or plate of fries going out. I looked around the kitchen and decided to make some homemade mac and cheese. We had all the ingredients: milk, cheese, flour, butter, and even some dried ground nutmeg and cayenne pepper. We threw the mac and cheese into little ramekins and crushed up some bread crumbs to put on top. At least I could contribute something new to the menu.”
― Victoria Benton Frank, My Magnolia Summer

“She picked up salted butter, thick Greek yoghurt, and cream.
The menu was not modest. Her basket was already heavy with Charlotte potatoes, fresh herbs, and a Duchy chicken.
It was too hot for a roast chicken, but Piglet had once heard Nigella say something about a house only being home once a chicken was in the oven. And anyway, there would be salads: one chopped and scattered with feta and sumac, another leafy with soft herbs. New potatoes, boiled and dotted with a bright salsa verde. Bread and two types of butter: confit garlic, and Parmesan and black pepper.”
― Lottie Hazell, Piglet

“The sequence would go as follows: the butternut-squash soup would be served with white wine (she'd bought a Sancerre at a decent-enough liquor store next to the grocery market). The coq au vin, which she would serve over buttered egg noodles, would go with the Pinot Noir that she'd also brought home. Then, finally, she would flambé the bananas Foster with them looking on--- igniting it dramatically with a tablespoon of the rum that she'd found in the liquor cabinet (no sense in buying a whole bottle for one tablespoon)--- and serve it all over vanilla ice cream.
Who could resist a meal like this? Who, after eating it, wouldn't want these recipes going into their cookbook? Who wouldn't want this to be their legacy?”
― Adam D. Roberts, Food Person

“Queenie preps for the morning, simple enough. Two huge Crock-Pots of oatmeal, jars of jam, honey, and brown sugar. She cuts up fruit. In the morning, she'll scramble several dozen eggs and toast several loaves of bread. Baking it from scratch crosses her mind--- she's always loved the meditation of kneading dough--- but only momentarily. She has no way of knowing how many will show. Simple is best until she gets the hang of things.
Lunch prep is even simpler. Sandwiches, PB&J, turkey, ham and cheese. She goes light on the mayo. It's hard to use jarred mayo, and even harder not to doctor it up with pesto or cranberry preserves. No arugula. No brie or caramelized onions. Simple, simple, simple.
Between breakfast and lunch, she plans to put up a pot of vegetable soup, so she gets to work on the mise en place for that. Store-bought stock, at least for now. Again, until she gets the hang of things. Dinner is lasagna, easy enough to put together and prebake; lasagna is always better for being allowed to sit overnight in the fridge. She hopes she's made enough of everything; sending people home hungry doesn't just go against her mission statement, it goes against every chef nerve in her body.
Not a chef. In this kitchen, never. She's a cook now. A soup kitchen cook making nutritious food for people in need. Her mission statement. Her balance.”
― Terri-Lynne DeFino, Didn't You Use to Be Queenie B?

“Much more energy is used to refrigerate and prepare food in the home than is used to produce it in the first place.”
― Lester R. Brown, Plan B 3.0: Mobilizing to Save Civilization

“When it comes to food, the amount of freedom you get is proportional to the responsibility you assume.”
― Thomas Lu, The Personal Sustainability Handbook: 60+ Practices to Sustainabilize Your Health, Finances, Relationships and Beyond