Jose Andres Quotes

I don't believe in traditional company structures because the best ideas do not always come from the top.

A plancha is just a hot flat surface. So if you think about it, anything is a plancha, like a saute pan or a griddle. A la plancha is the perfect way to cook for a crowd.

I love going to Rodeo Drive with my wife.

The cheapest gadget - and you don't even have to spend a dime - is chopsticks from a Chinese restaurant. I use them for everything: to toss salads, to turn a piece of meat in the pan, to flip croquettes in the Fryolator, to whisk eggs for omelets, to stir eggs into fried rice when I make that for my daughters.

The great-great-grandfather of my mother was probably using gelatins.

I have an amazing wife and three daughters that always keep me motivated.

Cotton candy is the most amazing form of caramelization ever invented by man.

Chef Michel Richard is always at the top of his game.

The first time I saw America was from my perch on the mast of a Spanish naval ship, where I could spot the Statue of Liberty reaching proudly into the open, endless American sky.

When I came to El Bulli, right away I knew I was becoming part of something incredible. It was like watching the Big Bang happening right in front of me.

Standing around the grill is fine, but I like to have my friends come in and out of the house. Movement makes the party more exciting.

People ask me in Europe, when they do interviews ... they ask me, 'Well, how does it feel to be a cook in a country that doesn't know how to eat?' It always touches a nerve, because Europe and the world think that America is no more than bad hot dogs and bad burgers.

In Hong Kong, 'wonton' means swallowing a cloud.

Anyone who knows me knows that I have never been shy about how important Ferran Adria has been in my life; he is a friend, a mentor, an inspiration.

I get bored of vacation.

In 2010, I created World Central Kitchen as a way to try and help find solutions to many of the food issues we face.

Recipes are overrated.

I'm very happy with how Jaleo in Las Vegas came together.

IBM has research and development; so do Microsoft and Nike and even Jose Andres. But there hasn't been enough R&D on feeding people in the Third World. This has to be part of the process; if not, we'll keep throwing money at the problem instead of investing in true solutions.

I don't understand how it's cheaper to buy a whole steak at the Price Club than spinach. How did that happen?

As immigrants, we understand better than most that to be an American is a privilege that conveys not just rights but responsibilities.

When you cook a sausage, the skin sometimes breaks and the ground meat comes apart.

I always say that I don't believe I'm a chef. I try to be a storyteller.

For me, there is no better tapa than a really good stuffed olive.

Look at our farmers' markets today, bursting with heritage breeds and heirloom varieties, foods that were once abundant when we were an agricultural nation, but that we have lost touch with. Bringing all these back helps us connect to our roots, our communities and helps us feed America the proper way.

My mother and I were born in Mieres, Asturias, the most beautiful region you'll ever see in Europe and the home of Cabrales, a great blue cheese made in the Asturian mountains. When I was young, we moved to Barcelona. Whenever my mother was homesick for Asturias, she'd eat a little piece of Cabrales to bring her closer to Mieres.

One thing that makes me very happy is to see the growing activism among chefs in America. Chefs like Tom Colicchio, Bill Telepan, and Rachel Ray and food writers like Michael Pollan have gone to Congress, indeed sometimes even have testified before Congress, have lent this support to Mrs. Obama's effort to combat childhood obesity.

I believe no chef becomes what he becomes without having many people influence him.

Puerto Rico is the perfect meeting place between Spain, the country I come from, and America, the country where I now belong. The meeting point of two worlds where magic can happen.

I want e by Jose Andres to be a discovery, to be a journey. I want people to find it and be astonished.

There is nothing better than picking up sun-warmed tomatoes and smelling them, feeling them and scrutinizing their shiny skins for imperfections, dreaming of ways to serve them.

When the earthquake hit Haiti in 2010, I was on vacation in the Cayman Islands.

I get very upset when people start adding weird things to romesco.

Like many parents after a long family holiday, I usually welcome the moment when my kids head back to school.

I love Ozomatli, this L.A. band that makes great coffee. They are half American, half Mexican, their coffee's great, and they're very good friends.

I started culinary school at a very young age, and really I wanted to be out working, cooking, more than I wanted to be in a classroom. You could say I wasn't a very good student - I wanted to be a student of life and experience.

When we are trying to come up with new health laws, you bring doctors, you bring experts in medicine. In urban planning, you bring the best architects. How it is possible that when we are talking about the way we are going to feed America, no chef shows up in the room?

As chefs, we cook to please people, to nourish people.

For me, Romesco is one of the greatest sauces in the world.

After a year, the aromatics in an olive oil are gone. Sometimes the bottles on the shelf in the supermarket are there a lot longer than you are.

Let me ask you: Who do you prefer, a clown organizing your menu - with all due respect to Mr. McDonald - or a chef? I do believe it's a very simple answer.

In Spain, you can go into any tapas bar, and you'll see anchovies all over the menu.

To feed a nation is never easy!

I guess that from the moment we are fed by our mothers, without even knowing it, we are caught in a net that brings us comfort, something we always feel when a special woman cooks for us. It is something unique and personal - it is something we want to keep for ourselves.

Food is about making an interaction with ingredients. If you talk to them, they will always tell you a story.

A cocktail can be made by the bartender. But the cocktail also can be made by the chef.

I work with companies like Audiostiles to put together mixes for my restaurants. I even created a soundtrack for my television show.

Today we take New England clam chowder as something traditional that makes our roots as American cooking very solid, with a lot of foundation. But the first person who decided to mix potatoes and clams and bacon and cream, in his own way 100 to 200 years ago, was a modernist.

It is time to embrace and celebrate ketchup, not be ashamed of it.

I love to talk about cooking and recipes, but I love as much talking about how food and cooking can change the world.

I remember that at the beginning of the month, the kind of menus my mom and father would prepare for us would have fish, chicken. But at the end of the month - because my father would be waiting for paycheck - the refrigerator would get empty. I remember that without a lot of food left, some of the best meals happened right there.

If you have some potatoes, green beans and cauliflower, you have a heck of a dish that can feed an entire family.

For food to be romantic, it should be light. Too many times people plan a romantic meal, and the food is too heavy.

Who needs one more chef in one more building with four walls and a kitchen?

I'm sorry for the ducks; I love foie gras.

I'm always looking to the future and what will next be on the horizon.

The time has come to recognize that food, how we produce it, process it, package it, sell it, cook it and eat it, is as important as any other issue.

To me, what I'm interested in, in the end, is the meaning of food in our lives.

I remember being a young boy in Spain and watching my parents cook. We didn't go to a lot of restaurants because we didn't always have the money, so cooking at home was just what we did.

I don't know any group of professionals that mobilize as fast and as often as chefs do when there are people who are in need.

I realized very early the power of food to evoke memory, to bring people together, to transport you to other places, and I wanted to be a part of that.

Everyting starts to happen at my home at 7 A. M., 7:20, when you hear the orange juicer. That means my daughters are already making the fresh Clementine juice.

In Spain, we mainly use red plum tomatoes, but it is always fun to experiment. Try using a mix of colors or substitute green tomatoes for plum next time you make a tomato dish.

Don't skimp on the ice. Bags from the grocery store melt so fast and water down your drinks. I prefer beautiful, big squares for my cocktails.

Gelatins are one of most unbelievable areas in cooking today.

For me, summer hasn't really started until tomatoes reappear in local farmers' markets.

I love cooking for the sake of understanding how people before me used to feed themselves, used to feed their families.

Education is everything. It's for everyone. We all need to be educated.

I prefer natural hardwood lump charcoal - the other stuff makes your food taste like Goodyear tires.

The right use of food can end hunger.

Old cookbooks connect you to your past and explain the history of the world.

Anyone who knows me knows that I always like to keep moving.

Soy sauce and seaweed go really well with potato chips.

I think when dishes have a certain amount of acidity, really they are very alive. And I love things that are alive.

My family and I cook at home almost every day together. The kitchen is the central and most important room in the house; it's a great way for us to connect. We love going to the farmer's market on Sundays as a family and choosing the ingredients together.

One day, we'll have 10, 20 or 50 Jaleos around America or around the world.

Your parents would not be happy if you came home and said you wanted to grow up to be a chef or a rock star.

Most people only use their griddles for pancakes, but you can sear vegetables like sliced zucchini or mushrooms, thinly sliced meats like chicken or pork, or thinly sliced fish or squid.

The history of cooking is my passion, and cooking is my passion.

Everyone else in the world still thinks of American food as ketchup.

I've been a cook all my life, but I am still learning to be a good chef. I'm always learning new techniques and improving beyond my own knowledge because there is always something new to learn and new horizons to discover.

I eventually settled in Washington, where my partners and I have been fortunate to build a restaurant business that now employs thousands of Americans across the country.

Steakhouses serve these big steaks. The first piece is hot, and the last piece is cold. The way I like to eat is to try three or four cuts of meat. People should actually be eating less meat, and the meat they eat should be special.

A lot of people prefer to be alone. They would rather be a palm tree on an island. I don't get it.

Tapas is a celebration of life.

Eating has to be fun.

All my life, I've had restaurants that were affordable.

Roberto Donna is a great Italian chef.

As I looked up to the stars, I began to cry. I thought the one star that was missing was the Puerto Rican star on the American flag.

Anchovies pair really well with fruit like a nectarines or clementine. The fruit complements the sweetness and saltiness of the anchovy.

We still have to keep betting on markets like America that are full of opportunities to grow, even if we have to work our heads off to do it.

The business of feeding people is the most amazing business in the world.

Dragon fruit is very subtle, very delicate. So you want to be careful not to kill it with things that have very strong flavor.

I believe the future is vegetables and fruits. They are so much more sexier than a piece of chicken.

If what I have to do is share a sandwich to lift someone's spirits, put a smile on their face - the worst thing that happens is I go broke!

The only way to have a better world and end poverty is by closing the gap between the top and the bottom.

I am from Spain, but my family and I have made America our home. For the last 17 years, I have been cooking Spanish food in Washington, D.C.

Man, the flavor of a pineapple is 100 times more powerful than the flavor of meat.

As a chef and as a father, I am very upset by what's on the menu at most schools: chicken nuggets and tater tots and ketchup and pizza.

We should all be involved in the avant-garde as long as we look toward the past.