Cookbooks have all become baroque and very predictable. Im looking for something different. A lot of chefs cookbooks are food as its done in the restaurants, but they are dumbed down, and I hate it when they dumb them down. – Mario Batali
Everyone makes pesto in a food processor. But the texture is better with a mortar and pestle, and its just as fast. – Mario Batali
When you cut that eggplant up and you roast it in the oven and you make the tomato sauce and you put it on top, your soul is in that food, and theres something about that that can never be made by a company that has three million employees. – Mario Batali
Although the skills arent hard to learn, finding the happiness and finding the satisfaction and finding fulfillment in continuously serving somebody else something good to eat, is what makes a really good restaurant. – Mario Batali
St. Louis has a lot of weird food customs that you dont see other places – and a lot of great ethnic neighborhoods. Theres a German neighborhood. A great old school Italian neighborhood, with toasted ravioli, which seems to be a St. Louis tradition. And they love provolone cheese in St. Louis. – Andy Cohen