Unless Your Kid Is Pele Jr., They're

I Know People That Could Serve Me Canned Tuna And Saltine Crackers And Have Me Feel More At Home At Their Table Than Some People Who Can Cook Circles Around Me. The More You Try To Impress People, Generally The Less You Do.

You Know Most Of The Food That Americans Hold So Dear - Things Like Hamburgers And Hot Dogs - Were Road Food, But Even Before They Were Road Food, They Were Peasant Food.

Butter Typically Melts Around, You Know, 90 Fahrenheit, As Opposed To About 20 Degrees Higher For Lard. So What That Means Is That When You're Working With It, The Lard Is Going To Stay More Solid, Which Is Great For Flakiness.

Take Ice. Ice Is Fascinating To Me. Ice Is The One Thing In Our World That Went From An Agricultural Product To Being Manufactured.

No Matter How Much Creativity Goes Into It, Cooking Is An Art. Or Perhaps I Should Say A Craft. It Abides By Absolute Rules, Physics, Chemistry, Etc. And That Means That Unless You Understand The Science You Cannot Reach The Art. We're Not Talking About Painting Here. Cooking's More Like Engineering. I Happen To Think That There Is Great Beauty In Great Engineering.