Yotam Ottolenghi Quotes
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Polenta is to northern Italy what bread is to Tuscany, what pasta is to Emilia-Romagna and what rice is to the Veneto: easy to make, hungry to absorb other flavours, and hugely versatile.
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You can really taste the difference between a shop-bought and a good homemade mayo.
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Dinner parties are still highly popular, and I believe they always will be.
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Yoghurt cuts sweetness and richness, tempers spice, and makes a dish sing.
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Going out for a meal, especially for young urbanites, is less about socialising over enjoyable food than about enjoying food as a way to socialise.
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I love the way soft white cheese such as ricotta or the creamier mascarpone reflect the milieu in which an animal has been raised.
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Stuffed vine leaves tend to burn and/or stick when you cook them. To avoid this, use a heavy based pan lined with a few layers of second-rate leaves.
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If the British Isles had an official vegetable, it would have to be the potato.
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Amaranth, the world's most nutritious grain, is available from health food stores.
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As with lemon juice, the more sorrel you use, the more it has to be balanced with something sweet, starchy or creamy - it's a yin-yang approach to cooking that I find rather calming.
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If I must choose between healthy and tasty, I go for the second: having only one life to waste, it might as well be a pleasurable one.
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The difference between brown and white rice is that the former is not milled. With the outer bran and germ intact, the rice is therefore chewier and nuttier.
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Most pumpkin dishes involve scooping out the seeds, cutting off the skin, and chopping up the flesh before cooking.
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Brunch, for me, is an extended breakfast that should be enjoyed whenever you have time properly to engage in cooking and eating.
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Fresh egg pasta is traditionally served in the north of Italy with butter, cream and rich meat sauces, whereas dried pasta is more at home with the tomato- and olive oil-based ones of the south.
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How can something that's 95% water be so divisive? Alone among vegetables, the poor, innocent stick of celery elicits the most vicious attacks.
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The smells of slow cooking spread around the house and impart a unique warmth matched only by the flavour of the food.
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A well-made salad must have a certain uniformity; it should make perfect sense for those ingredients to share a bowl.
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A lemon, boiled whole and blitzed, makes a useful base for all sorts of dressings.
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Some days, just occasionally, when I've had just one too many chickpeas, drizzles of olive oil or chunks of feta, I crave a return to the sushi-filled joints of Tokyo.
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Plums are a good substitute for gooseberries.
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It's well worth making your own harissa, but there are some very good commercial varieties.
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Way back when I was a junior pastry chef, I'd bake loads of muffins every morning, as many as 120 or so, while operating on autopilot.
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Having grown up in the Middle East, eating beans for breakfast always seemed like a bizarre British eccentricity.