“An acquaintance of ours who was at the time deputy director of food services in Washington for the House of Representatives was asked to prepare a huge meal in honor of Julia Child’s seventieth birthday. Not wanting to disappoint America’s most important culinary icon, he created a menu designed to woo any Francophile: oeufs à la Chimay, pantin aux épinards, pissaladière, and other classic dishes. After reviewing his menu, Julia responded: “I really like sausages.” John quickly revised the menu to include Cajun andouille, boudin blanc, Toulouse saucisson, and truffle-laced pork and veal sausage in brioche. The menu was met with approval. Julia knew. Sausage is great to eat. Period.”

~ from the chapter on Sausages in Charcuterie: The Craft of Salting, Smoking, and Curing, by Michael Ruhlman and Brian Polcyn, W. W. Norton & Co., New York, 2005

“Americans adore fried foods and yet we’re willing to entrust the process to tenth graders wearing polyester smocks and funny hats…strange.

YOU: What the heck’s so great about frying?

ME: Remember the mean Terminator in Terminator2?

YOU: The guy that was made out of that liquid metal stuff?

ME: Imagine having a pan made out of that stuff. That’s what frying’s like.

YOU: How’s that?

ME: Because you fry in fat, and fat’s dry.

YOU: But it’s a liquid.

ME: Just because it’s a liquid doesn’t mean it’s wet. Mercury’s a liquid.

YOU: Well, it doesn’t matter. Fried food’s greasy.

ME: Not if you do it right.”

-from the intro to the chapter on Frying in Alton Brown’s I’m Just Here for the Food: Version 2.0; Stewart, Tabori & Chang; New York, 2006

“Had Pavlov gone to a few wedding receptions or hung out at a brunch buffet or two he might not have had to measure up spaniel spit. His theories regarding conditioning could easily have proven themselves at the carving station. I’ve worked the carving station and I don’t care if it’s a steamship round, a loin roast, a standing rib roast, or a charred buffalo head, flash some golden crust and a little rosy pink flesh and the culinary tractor beam engages. It’s like a bug zapper for humans.”

-from the intro to the chapter on Roasting in Alton Brown’s I’m Just Here for the Food: Version 2.0; Stewart, Tabori & Chang; New York, 2006

“…the very pretext brought forward in support of [serving Savories after Sweets], so erroneous from the gastronomical standpoint, namely, ‘that after a good dinner it is necessary to serve something strange and highly seasoned, in order to whet the diner’s thirst,’ is its own condemnation.

For, if appetite is satiated and thirst is quenched, it follows that the diner has taken all that is necessary. Therefore, anything more that he may be stimulated to take will only amount to excess, and excess in gastronomy, as in everything else, is a fault that can find no excuse.”

–from the intro to Part II, Recipes and Methods of Procedure, in The Escoffier Cook Book by A. Escoffier. New York: Crown, 1941.

“Sometime about the middle of the 1920′s I seem to remember my first bacon-wrapped snack, served to accompany bathtub gin martinis. Good bathtub gin was not without its merits, but it needed food to keep one in shape for the second and third drink, so snacks became more hearty. I’m certain the first snack of this type I had was one I find often these days in trekking around the country–a bacon-wrapped crisp cracker or saltine. It still makes on of the more successful items in this genre, although practically everything you can think of has been wrapped in bacon these last years.”

–You gotta love this guy!–from the chapter on Cocktail Food in James Beard’s American Cookery by James Beard. Boston: Little, Brown & Company, 1972.

“Desserts are served at the end of the meal to revive interest in the meal and to produce a sense of complete satisfaction…they leave a lingering memory of the delicious flavor…and they appeal to the eye as well as the palate. All of which would be good enough reason for trying every one of the recipes in this chapter. But you’ll probably need no coaxing to do that, for where is the hostess who doesn’t enjoy the feeling of pride that accompanies the moment when she brings in the dessert, and who doesn’t love to hear the Oh’s and Ah’s that are sure to greet a particularly delectable creation?”

–intro to the Desserts chapter in Meta Given’s Modern Encyclopedia of Cooking, Volume I by Meta Given. Chicago: J. G. Ferguson, 1959.