75 Best Cooking Quotes For Culinary Inspiration
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Are you running low on inspiration, considering takeout menus, and losing your cooking mojo, or is fear of failure holding you back from the joy of cooking?
A collection of cooking quotes will bring back this delight because cooking is like any art form that requires a little nudge when you are facing a real stumbling block. These quotes about cooking are like energy boosters, the more the better to motivate you to experience adult joy and cooking satisfaction.
A little creativity, a sprinkle of love, any recipe you’ve jotted down on some frayed page and some motivating cooking quotes can be your secret weapon to bring out your joy and cooking miracles.
Want some good food-related quotes for your collection? Why not look at baking quotes and breakfast quotes that will make your heart jump with joy.
Best Cooking Quotes Of All Time
There are plenty of personal secrets to cooking that you can store up your sleeves. Do not let the fear of failure in cooking hold you back from showing your culinary skills and producing some good food for everyone.
Cooking done with care is an act of joy and cooking done with love is always appreciated. Here are some popular cooking quotes you can count on!
1. “I cook, I create, I’m incredibly excited by what I do, I’ve still got a lot to achieve.”
2. "You don't need a silver fork to eat good food."
- Paul Prudhomme.
3. “I feel a recipe is only a theme, which an intelligent cook can play each time with a variation.”
– Madam Benoit.
4. “Cooking is an observation-based process that you can’t do if you’re so completely focused on a recipe.”
– Alton Brown.
5. "Laughter is brightest where food is best."
–Irish proverb.
6. When baking, follow directions. When cooking, go by your own taste.
– Laiko Bahrs.
7. “If God had intended us to follow recipes, He wouldn’t have given us grandmothers.”
– Linda Henley.
8. “Cookery is not chemistry. It is an art. It requires instinct and taste rather than exact measurements.”
– Marcel Boulestin.
9. "Food is a necessary component to life. People can live without Renoir, Mozart, Gaudi, Beckett, but they cannot live without food."
- Grant Achatz.
10. “Food is a passion. Food is love.”
- Hector Elizondo.
11. “In the childhood memories of every good cook, there’s a large kitchen, a warm stove, a simmering pot and a mom.”
– Barbara Costikyan.
Funny Cooking Quotes
The most dreaded stumbling block is fear in any cooking endeavor. Julia Child talks about the best attitude to have for cooking, which is a "what the hell attitude", in her famous cooking quote. A little humor never hurts, so here are some fun-filled quotes about cooking that will cheer your heart and inspire cooking creativity.
12. "A balanced diet is a cookie in each hand."
– Barbara Johnson.
13. "Life is a combination of magic and pasta."
- Federico Fellini.
14. “The only real stumbling block is fear of failure. In cooking you've got to have a what-the-hell attitude.”
– Julia Child.
15. “Cooking is at once child's play and adult joy. And cooking done with care is an act of love.”
- Craig Claiborne.
16. "Ice cream is exquisite. What a pity it isn't illegal."
– Voltaire.
17. "Tomatoes and oregano make it Italian, wine and tarragon make it French, sour cream makes it Russian, lemon and cinnamon make it Greek, soy sauce makes it Chinese, garlic makes it good."
– Alice May Brock.
18. “Cuisine has become too complicated — this is about subject, verb, adjective: duck, turnips, sauce.”
– Alain Ducasse.
19. “The way you make an omelet reveals your character.”
– Anthony Bourdain.
20. “Tis an ill cook that cannot lick his own fingers.”
— William Shakespeare.
21. "The only time to eat diet food is while you're waiting for the steak to cook."
– Julia Child.
22. “Life is uncertain. Eat dessert first.”
- Ernestine Ulmer.
23. "People who love to eat are always the best people."
– Julia Child.
24. “Fish, to taste right, must swim three times — in water, in butter and in wine.”
– Polish Proverb.
25. "Tell me what you eat, and I will tell you what you are."
– Anthelme Brillat-Savarin.
26. “People want honest, flavorful food, not some show-off meal that takes days to prepare.”
— Ted Allen.
27. "All happiness depends on a leisurely breakfast."
- John Gunther.
28. “The discovery of a new dish does more for the happiness of mankind than the discovery of a star.”
— Anthelme Brillat-Savarin.
29. “I cook with wine, sometimes I even add it to the food.”
– W C Fields.
30. “I like the Japanese knives, I like French knives. Whatever's sharp.”
- Wolfgang Puck.
31. “Cooking and shopping for food brings rhythm and meaning to our lives.”
— Alice Waters.
32. “So when people ask me, ‘What do you think of Michelin?’ I don’t cook for guides. I cook for customers.”
– Gordon Ramsay.
33. “Invest in what’s real. Clean as you go. Drink while you cook. Make it fun. It doesn’t have to be complicated.”
— Gwyneth Paltrow.
34. “The most remarkable thing about my mother is that for thirty years she served the family nothing but leftovers. The original meal has never been found.”
– Calvin Trillin.
35. “Do not allow watching food to replace making food.”
– Alton Brown.
36. Kitchens are hard environments and they form incredibly strong characters.”
– Gordon Ramsay.
37. "To eat is a necessity, but to eat intelligently is an art."
- François de la Rochefoucauld.
Heart Warming Cooking Quotes
The easiest way to win someone’s heart is through the stomach. Even the most difficult cooking recipe, when entered into with enthusiasm, feels like a child’s play and adult joy that’s easy peasy.
Making food is something simple that can be done without complicated information or exotic ingredients. Simple homemade food can cheer up someone and bind a family as it is an act of love.
38. “Food is not just eating energy. It's an experience.”
– Guy Fieri.
39. “Cooking is like love. It should be entered into with abandon or not at all.”
- Harriet Van Horne.
40. “Cooking is at once one of the simplest and most gratifying of the arts, but to cook well, one must love and respect food.”
- Craig Claiborne.
41. “A chef is a mixture maybe of artistry and craft. You have to learn the craft really to get there.”
– Wolfgang Puck.
42. “I'm just someone who likes cooking and for whom sharing food is a form of expression.”
– Maya Angelou.
43. “A recipe has no soul. You, as the cook, must bring soul to the recipe.”
– Thomas Keller.
44. “Cooking with kids is not just about ingredients, recipes, and cooking. It’s about harnessing imagination, empowerment, and creativity.”
– Guy Fieri.
45. “For me, cooking is an expression of the land where you are and the culture of that place.”
– Wolfgang Puck.
46. “Cooking is about creating something delicious for someone else.”
— Ayumi Komura.
47. “No one who cooks, cooks alone. Even at her most solitary, a cook in the kitchen is surrounded by generations of cooks past, the advice and menus of cooks present, the wisdom of cookbook writers.”
— Laurie Colwin.
48. “Respect for food is respect for life, for who we are and what we do.”
–Thomas Keller.
Inspiring Cooking Quotes
You can never say enough to appreciate a good cook but encouraging someone with cooking quotes is a wonderful way to show your gratitude. Cooking requires great effort and patience. The act of love that goes into cooking often goes unnoticed. Make a great cook feel loved today with these motivating cooking quotes.
49. “Until I discovered cooking, I was never really interested in anything.”
— Julia Child.
50. “…no one is born a great cook, one learns by doing.”
— Julia Child.
51. “Cooking requires confident guesswork and improvisation, experimentation and substitution, dealing with failure, and uncertainty in a creative way.”
— Paul Theroux.
52. “I want them to bite into a cookie, and think of me, and smile. Food is love. Food has a power. I knew it in my mind, but now I know it in my heart.”
- Jael McHenry.
53. “Cooking is like painting or writing a song. Just as there are only so many notes or colors, there are only so many flavors — it’s how you combine them that sets you apart.”
— Wolfgang.
54. “Cooking demands attention, patience, and, above all, a respect for the gifts of the earth.”
– Judith B Jones.
55. “Cooking is an act of love, a gift, a way of sharing with others the little secrets -- 'piccoli segreti' -- that are simmering on the burners.”
– Sophia Loren.
56. “One cannot think well, love well, sleep well if one has not dined well.”
– Virginia Woolf.
57. “Cooking is like love, you do it well, or you do not do it at all.”
- Harriet Van Horne.
58. "We all eat, and it would be a sad waste of opportunity to eat badly."
– Anna Thomas.
59. “There is no sincere love than the love of food.”
– George Bernard Shaw.
60. “Food is a reminder of our humanity, our fragility, our createdness.”
- Shauna Niequist.
61. “The most indispensable ingredient of all good home cooking: love for those you are cooking for.”
–Sophia Loren.
62. “If you want to become a great chef, you have to work with great chefs. And that’s exactly what I did.”
– Gordon Ramsay.
63. “Cooking is like snow skiing: If you don’t fall at least 10 times, then you’re not skiing hard enough.”
- Guy Fieri.
64. “It’s not about passion. ….. Passion ebbs and flows. To me, it’s about desire. If you have a constant, unwavering desire to be a cook, then you’ll be a great cook.”
– Thomas Keller.
Cooking Quotes That Double Up As Instagram Captions
You need a collection of good cooking quotes and sayings to make your Instagram captions noticeable and fun. Whether it is something new you made, or an exotic dish at a restaurant, when you want to speak your heart out, famous cooking quotes will take them to a whole new level.
Follow what the restaurant critic Craig Claiborne said, "cooking represents an act of love".
65. “Food, glorious food!”
– Lionel Bart.
66. “All sorrows are less with bread.”
– Don Quixote.
67. “The greatest dishes are very simple.”
– Auguste Escoffier.
68. "Cooking is the ultimate giving."
- Jamie Oliver.
69. “We must have a pie. Stress cannot exist in the presence of a pie.”
– David Mamet.
70. "'Chef' doesn't mean that you're the best cook, it simply means 'boss.'"
- Tom Colicchio.
71. "I always say that I don't believe I'm a chef. I try to be a storyteller."
- Jose Andres.
72. “The greatest dishes are very simple.”
– Auguste Escoffier.
73. “If you’re afraid of butter, use cream.”
– Julia Child.
74. “Condiments are like old friends—highly thought of, but often taken for granted.”
– Marilyn Kaytor.
75. “Without ice cream, there would be darkness and chaos.”
– Don Kardong.
Here at Kidadl, we have carefully created lots of interesting family-friendly quotes for everyone to enjoy! If you liked our suggestions for 75 best cooking quotes for culinary inspiration, then why not take a look at bacon quotes, or cake quotes.
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Bachelor of Science specializing in Human Anatomy
Joan AgieBachelor of Science specializing in Human Anatomy
With 3+ years of research and content writing experience across several niches, especially on education, technology, and business topics. Joan holds a Bachelor’s degree in Human Anatomy from the Federal University of Technology, Akure, Nigeria, and has worked as a researcher and writer for organizations across Nigeria, the US, the UK, and Germany. Joan enjoys meditation, watching movies, and learning new languages in her free time.
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