David Chang Quotes

I think that the Japanese - and I do love Japanese cuisine and adore Japanese food culture - I think that they're going to plow through the entire world's fishing. They're going to eat everything anyways.

Be careful what you wish for - getting to be a successful business and maintaining it is so hard. Anyone can be good one night; being good over several years is incredibly difficult.

If people ask me, 'What do you think could improve in Toronto dining,' I'd say there's nothing to improve on.

I'm always criticizing and only see the mistakes.

I feel like I'm losing my ability to understand reality; like when someone loses their hearing, they can still speak English, but their speech eventually becomes distorted because they can't hear themselves.

Open your refrigerator, your freezer, your kitchen cupboards, and look at the labels on your food. You'll find 'natural flavor' or 'artificial flavor' in just about every list of ingredients. The similarities between these two broad categories are far more significant than the differences.

I love the intensity of the fine-dining kitchen, but loathe the fine-dining experience.

As a child, I didn't see my dad that much because he was always working at the restaurant. He became pretty jaded after working at the restaurant for so long.

I work so hard that I forget to take care of myself.

Waiting tables has never paid my bills, a fact which I prefer to hide from my colleagues with deep sighs about the price of just about everything.

I'm not cooking every day anymore, and that's the biggest withdrawal. Cooking is honest work. Now I don't know how to measure myself.

To me, there are two types of celebrity: there's good celebrity - people that are attracted to the food and working and trying to create something great - and then there's bad celebrity - those who are working on being a celebrity.

I'm a big sports fan.

Fine dining teaches you how to cook many different things, and it gives you the basic fundamentals, but these specialty restaurants, they're not teaching you the broad foundation you need to become a well-rounded cook.

If people think you are this amazing, own it.

Cooking and gardening involve so many disciplines: math, chemistry, reading, history.

To eat well, I always disagree with critics who say that all restaurants should be fine dining. You can get a Michelin star if you serve the best hamburger in the world.

I was going to either fail or thrive, and I was going to do it in full view of everyone I respected and resented.

Contemporary ramen is totally different than what most Americans think ramen should be. Ramen is not one thing; there are many, many different types.

There are many things to admire about Japan but this is the one thing I love the most and probably the only time I eat breakfast. Fish, eggs, soup, salad, veggies; all in the tiniest bites. It's a full meal, but it's so refreshing.

I think the basic thing that home cooks can learn how to do is just season properly ... If the home cook realized how little salt they use compared to what's needed, it would make their food taste better.

I love chicken. I love chicken products: fried chicken, roasted chicken, chicken nuggets - whatever. And going to Japan, I would see that these chicken were smoked and then grilled and then have this amazing crispy skin.

The one reason why I got into cooking was because I wasn't good at anything else - not that I was good at it, but it was considered honest work.

I think the best restaurants in America should be in California.

America is a country of abundance, but our food culture is sad - based on huge portions and fast food. Let's stop with the excuses and start creating something better.

Don't even get me started. I'm not against all vegetarians. But if you're a vegetarian for ethical reasons, you may be causing more harm.

People are trying to figure out what American food is; it's certainly an amalgamation.

Recovering alcoholics talk about needing to hit rock bottom before they are able to climb out. The paradox for the workaholic is that rock bottom is the top of whatever profession they're in.

I wanted so badly to please him and my mom. I was simply incapable. What happens when you live with a tiger that you can't please is that you're always afraid.

Chef Thomas Keller was an inspiration to me and many, many young cooks like me. He told us that the role of the new, modern chef is different.

Why can't it be awesome to work for a food company? Why can't we create an environment where people are trying to push each other to do great things, and we're not trying to steal from anybody - we're trying to be good to our farmers and run an honorable business, if there is such a thing anymore?

The Momofuku Culinary Lab started as a space where we could focus on creating and innovating. I didn't want us to worry about working on projects in a restaurant; there are just too many distractions in service and running a kitchen to be able to focus on creating your dishes.

Growing up, my dad owned a restaurant in Washington, DC, and food was something I was passionate about. But when I finally got into it, I felt like it was so late in the game; that's why I worked seven days a week at Craft and Mercer Kitchen. I wanted to see how far I could take it.

The process and organization leading up to cooking the egg can tell you a lot about the cook.

One of the benefits to ordering food in New York is that you can get food 24/7.

In New York, we're always confined with spaces. Our restaurants are difficult to navigate as cooks and to operate. We fight against the buildings we run in New York.

I doubt I'd ever do television to the extent that, say, Gordon Ramsay has.

When you meet the farmers and go to the farms, you see that they treat their animals like they're family. It makes a big difference.

There's the common misconception that restaurants make a lot of money. It's not true. If you look at maybe the top chef in the world, or at least monetarily, it's like Wolfgang Puck, but he makes as much money as an average crappy investment banker.

Just because something's been good in the past doesn't mean it will continue to be good.

I want to make simple food new.

I look forward to the spring vegetables because the season is so short. Mushrooms, edible foraged herbs, wild leeks, early season asparagus.

I was quite cocky, but having been hailed as this great young golfer, I couldn't even make the high school golf team once I got there. I had a big dose of humble pie then, and ever since, I've always known that there is always someone out there better than you, more talented. Always.

'Tampopo's amazing. I think it's an absolutely fantastic movie, but I don't think it captures for me the meaning of food.

I hate to say 'chain restaurant,' but we're sort of a corporation now. How do we defy that concept, where people assume each restaurant can't be good?

We're hoping to succeed; we're okay with failure. We just don't want to land in between.

People are getting famous now for serving food out of a truck, or for, well, pork buns. I don't know if I'm really pleased to be a part of that. I'm somewhat terrified of what the future holds, especially in America.

If you ask what people say what American cuisine is, they cannot really do it. I don't know what it is.