Wylie Dufresne

Typically, you learn how to cook, but you don't know why. We were looking for a deeper understanding of what was happening to our food as we roasted it, boiled it, grilled it, chopped it, etc. And it turned out, as we began to really say what is cooking, what does it mean to cook, there's a lot of science involved.

The spirit of pickling is one of adventure and fun.

I've always had fond memories of cooking Thanksgiving.

My job has changed over the years, 22 years roughly I've been cooking professionally. When I was younger, I aspired to be the star player. Now, it's more I like to sit in the dugout and make sure the team wins the game.

I think it's important for anyone who is artistic to look back on their body of work and be critical. Maybe the Beatles can look back and say everything was perfect, but we've come up with hundreds and hundreds of dishes, and anyone who is honest with themselves has to realize that every single one wasn't an absolute, unequivocal home run.

I have no interest in vegetarians whatsoever. Zero. Less than zero.

Being a chef isn't the ideal career to intersect with parenting, but I try to be in my kids' lives as much as possible.

The East Village is where I cut my teeth as a kid. I ran around here on a skateboard.

We have fried things in cubes, historically. We tried bars of Hollandaise, we tried different shapes, but it ultimately seemed like the cube was the right shape.

Top Chef' is always entertaining - it's hard to stop watching, like a good hockey fight, but no one gets hurt. It's great that the format is so inherently dramatic and can make cooking so entertaining to people who might not ordinarily be interested in a cooking show. Good for the industry all round.

I present classics in an unfamiliar way or unfamiliar ingredients and preparations in a classical way.

I don't think of eggs as being fundamental to the flavor of mayonnaise, but they are to Hollandaise.