Yotam Ottolenghi Quotes
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What makes maftoul worth celebrating is that it's so easy and forgiving to cook.
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A lemon, boiled whole and blitzed, makes a useful base for all sorts of dressings.
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If the first bite is with the eye and the second with the nose, some people will never take that third, actual bite if the food in question smells too fishy, fermented or cheesy.
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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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Having grown up in the Middle East, eating beans for breakfast always seemed like a bizarre British eccentricity.
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On many occasions, an informal buffet and casual seating offer a little more intimacy than a loud gathering around a big table.
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When I was a kid, there was always food to be had on the street in Jerusalem, but anything above a falafel stand was mediocre or worse.
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Custard is controversial: what makes it a custard, how best to cook it and, crucially, is it to be eaten or put in a pie and thrown?
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Barberries, or zereshk, are tiny dried red fruit with a tremendously sharp flavour. They come from Iran, where they're used to add freshness to rice and chicken dishes.
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Plums are a good substitute for gooseberries.
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When it comes to cooking pasta, the first essential is to make sure you have a big enough pot: it needs room to roll in the water while cooking.
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The moment to tell my barber I was gay just never came up.
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For me, the end of childhood came when the number of candles on my birthday cake no longer reflected my age, around 19 or 20. From then on, each candle came to represent an entire decade.
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You can be vegetarian and eat fish. It's your choice, just say: 'I am what I am.' There are no hardcore divisions anymore.
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Date syrup is a natural sweetener that has wonderful richness and treacly depth; I drizzle it over semolina porridge.
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Halva works brilliantly in ice-cream.
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Many people struggle to make hummus that lives up to their expectations at home, and recreating a favourite brand or the stuff from your local deli is almost impossible.
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Take your average couscous salad, and it's almost always a sloppy mush, no matter how much attention has gone into getting flavours in there.
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Seasonality in winter doesn't have to mean sleep-inducing, stew-like, starchy casseroles.
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Buttermilk's palate-cleansing tartness is one reason it's used a lot in southern India, where meals often end with a small bowl of the stuff served with plain rice and pickles.
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It's hard to beat the rough texture of steel-cut oats, with their slight resistance against the teeth.
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I'm a firm believer that the world should be your oyster when you're cooking. People should open themselves to other cuisines - there are a lot of hidden secrets all over the world.
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Stereotypical vegetarian food looks gray and brown.
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Sweet potatoes are ideal for lazy days: just bake, then mash and mix with yogurt, butter or olive oil.