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

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

Before I had my own restaurant, I was never top dog in the kitchen. I've always had a low opinion of myself as a cook.

Any processed chicken from any place - I'll order it in a heartbeat. I'm very picky about my pork, though.

If I have a really bad cook or a bad manager or bad sous-chef, I previously would have fired them or lost my temper. But now I realize that if I'm so right, then I should be able to communicate it so clearly that they get it.

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.

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.

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

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'm grasping with how you do something on a large scale with multiple operations and not have quality decrease.

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.

'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'm a big sports fan.

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.

Yes, natural is good and healthy, and whole foods are important. However, experimentation is important, too.

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?

Shouldn't a three-course meal be 90 minutes? Do you know how hard you have to edit your menu to pull that off? Twenty-seven minutes. That's the average meal at Jiro's in Tokyo.

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

I really don't care for the proper chef coat.

I was terrible at desk jobs.

I learned so much more prepping vegetables than I ever did in cooking school.

I'm always criticizing and only see the mistakes.

I don't like eating in restaurants.

I constantly think I'm a fraud - that this success is not warranted or justified.

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

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.

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

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.

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'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.

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.

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.

If you're going to be a vegetarian, limit yourself to food from a place you can go to in two hours and just eat that.

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.

If people think you are this amazing, own it.

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?

I like eggs. My favorite way of cooking eggs is old school French.

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

The livelihood of the restaurant is dependent upon getting the word out.

I lived across the street from Noodle Bar. I could barely stand it, because you're there all the time; you can't get away.

When I first started to cook, I would cook these elaborate meals, but I rarely cook at home now.

Momofuku is not me. It's everyone. I'm just the facade. We have to exceed expectations and be our harshest critics.

I've never bribed my way into a restaurant. I've never slipped a C-note or greased a palm. In truth, I've never even considered it. I've assumed, of course, that people do such things.

For everyday diners in Manhattan, cracking the waiting list at Nobu is said to be harder than getting courtside tickets for the Knicks.

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.

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.

My dad was in the restaurant business, but I didn't really think about following him. Had I done better at school, I don't know if I would have been a chef.

Say a child raises this beautiful beet. It's going to give her a sense of ownership, and that changes everything. You stop taking things for granted; you become less wasteful.

Running a business anywhere isn't easy.

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.