“Failure is enriching. It’s also important to accept that you’ll make mistakes – it’s how you build your expertise.”

The image foreigners have of French cuisine is fattening and very fancy food. But it’s not true – French food isn’t just rich. The word “healthy” doesn’t exist in French.

The relentless pursuit of being different is very French.

Cuisine has become too complicated – this is about subject, verb, adjective: duck, turnips, sauce.

Desserts are like mistresses. They are bad for you. So if you are having one, you might as well have two.

At my home in the southwest of France, I grow oak, hazel, and lemon trees in my backyard.

Everywhere in the world there are tensions – economic, political, religious. So we need chocolate.

Techniques are not the most difficult to teach. The attitudes chefs take are much more important.

I have a very modern way of thinking; the chef is there to lead the team and not just to sit behind the piano.

The planets resources are rare; we must consume more ethically and equitably.

It should be slow-cooked and seasonal. That’s my vision.

You can mix two styles and get fusion; any more and you just get confusion.

Nowadays, food needs to be healthy, local, sustainable and not filled with too much fat, salt or sugar.

The Asian airlines have the best wine programs.

Tasting a dish should be memorable If nothing remains in the memory of a single guest, then I have made a mistake.

Classical cooking and molecular gastronomy should remain separate.

It is impossible to remain indifferent to Japanese culture. It is a different civilisation where all you have learnt must be forgotten.

As far as I know, if you take your time, write a good script and make a good film, then give the audience time, they will accept it.

When we accept life as it is, we can respond appropriately to the way we’re experiencing it, rather than just reacting out of fear and aversion.

It’s an effulgence of the mind. It’s a brightness that is truly sensitive and accepting. It’s an ability to accept life as it is.

Do not be in a hurry or try to push your practice. If you become peaceful, then accept it,; if you don’t become peaceful, then accept that also.

How clever the human mind is, that it can accept two contradictory things as ‘facts.’ Yes, I know that in this case one ‘fact’ was untrue. But the human mind can KNOW something is untrue and still accept it as a ‘fact,’ and act on it as if it were true.

You know Hachi, your life depends only on ourselves. I’m still convinced about this… But I’ve also learned to accept that people… don’t all become as strong, and it made me kinder than before.

I refuse to be released on the basis of a ‘condition for negotiations’ and I will not accept the price for my freedom to be several meters of the land of Palestine, the land that we have fought for and been imprisoned for.

When you abide and accept everything completely and fully, you automatically go beyond.