Alton Quotes & Sayings

I can be so involved that I am no longer conscious of my needs or even of any pains. But there also have been many times when I felt the exhaustion - when it was physically painful, but I just couldn't stop. — Alton Tobey

Recipe writers hate to write about heat. They despise it. Because there aren't proper words for communicating what should be done with it. — Alton Brown

I'm an absolute connoisseur of cheeseburgers and like to think that I can detect even mere percentages of shift in fat content in ground meat in a burger and can actually name the temperature to which it was actually cooked to the degree if I'm, you know, really on my game. — Alton Brown

Life will deal me many different hands, some good, some bad (maybe they've already been dealt), but from here on in, I'll be turning my own cards.
- Alton Richard — Louis Sachar

Unless your kid is Pele Jr., they're not going to be able to feed themselves from soccer. If your kid knows how to play soccer, but not make dinner, you have done them a disservice. — Alton Brown

'Outlaw Cook' was a revelation. Folks like Jeff Smith and Marcella Hazan got me interested in cooking, but John Thorne pushed me into the path that I follow to this day. This is the only cookbook I've ever read that understands how men really eat: over the sink, in the dark, greasy to the elbows. — Alton Brown

My mantra was to educate people - to actually give them the know-how they could use - and to do it in a very subversive kind of way. I would entertain them, and I was going to teach them whether they knew it or not. — Alton Brown

Break into Alton Towers! I would ... break into McDonalds. And I would kiss everyone. On the lips ... before I left the world. I mean, man and female. — Tom Meighan

I like television. I still believe that television is the most powerful form of communication on Earth - I just hate what is being done with it. — Alton Brown

Remember, America: organization will set you free. — Alton Brown

If the civil authorities refuse to protect me, I must look to God, and if I die, I have determined to make my grave in Alton. — Elijah Parish Lovejoy

Racism. It's ugly. Even in tubers. — Alton Brown

A balanced diet may be the best medicine. I was eating too much good eats. But people consider that part of your job, you know? Eat. And I do! — Alton Brown

Every single person is unlike anyone else. Therefore, in creating a portrait of someone ... we must look carefully to catch that particular unique quality. In fact, we can neglect nothing because everything we select or do sends a message to the observer ... — Alton Tobey

Last year, I made a refrigerator in my basement. And I needed to because I needed to figure how - you know there is no such thing as 'cold.' There is only less heat. — Alton Brown

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. — Alton Brown

The thing that helped me get into the film business was that I went to school in Athens, Georgia and managed to get on, um, working on music videos for a band called R.E.M. and that kind of opened up a lot of doors for me. — Alton Brown

The problem is I am both a procrastinator and a power junkie, so I am very frustrating to work with. — Alton Brown

It is the special privilege of the fine artist to reveal immediate data with a clarity, intensity and purity that promotes them to a special degree of reality. — Alton Tobey

Sometimes Alton Darwin would talk to me about the planet he was on before he was transported in a steel box to Athena. 'Drugs were food,' he said. 'I was in the food business. Just because people on one planet eat a certain kind of food they're hungry for, that makes them feel better after they eat it, that doesn't mean people on other planets shouldn't eat something else. On some planets I'm sure there are people who eat stones, and then feel wonderful for a little while afterwords. Then it's time to eat stones again. — Kurt Vonnegut

I'm going from doing all of the work to having to delegate the work - which is almost harder for me than doing the work myself. I'm a lousy delegator, but I'm learning. — Alton Brown

I only really fake it anymore with sommeliers who are being really snotty to me and I don't want to take their grief and so I try to do something to kind of throw them off or put them on the defensive, even if I don't know what I'm talking about. — Alton Brown

So I quit my job and went to the New England Culinary Institute for the full two years and worked in the restaurant industry after that until finally I thought I had a grasp on what I needed to do what I do. — Alton Brown

Molecular gastronomy is not bad ... but without sound, basic culinary technique, it is useless. — Alton Brown

Now my wife may think she's locked me out of the kitchen but MacGyver's not my patron saint for nothing. — Alton Brown

Your patience will be rewarded. — Alton Brown

I have been beset night and day at Alton. And now, if I leave here and go elsewhere, violence may overtake me in my retreat, and I have no more claim upon the protection of any other community than I have upon this. — Elijah Parish Lovejoy

A lot of food shows need only to tempt. Some food shows only need to inspire, to empower. And there are a lot of shows that do that. — Alton Brown

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. — Alton Brown

I became a cook so I could cook and tell stories in wacky ways. — Alton Brown

Although I don't take myself very seriously, I do take my work extraordinarily seriously. — Alton Brown

I'm like a really goofy home ec teacher. — Alton Brown

Culinary tradition is not always based on fact. Sometimes it's based on history, on habits that come out of a time when kitchens were fueled by charcoal. — Alton Brown

My feeling has always been that 'Good Eats' would have never happened had it been left to a committee. — Alton Brown

My message is very simple and universal, not very intellectual, but humane. Just love each other and live. — Alton Ellis

I love so much you see, you're even in my dreams
I can hear baby, I can hear you calling me
I'm so in love with you, all I ever want to do is
Thank you baby, thank you baby.. — Alton Ellis

I'm a filmmaker who decided to go to culinary school. All I picked up was the fact if I didn't understand what was going on with every single ingredient, I could be qualifying for, like, the lunch food job at my daughter's school. — Alton Brown

Slicing a warm slab of bacon is a lot like giving a ferret a shave. No matter how careful you are, somebody's going to get hurt. — Alton Brown

There is a kinship between music and painting - with the same words used to describe both, as when a musical composition is said to have color and a painting to have rhythm. — Alton Tobey

The moral of this story is not everything that's slick is non-stick, and not everything non-stick is slick. — Alton Brown

Do not allow watching food to replace making food. — Alton Brown

We're getting dumbed down, taste-wise. — Alton Brown

Wine is like women. It tempts you; it comforts you; it confuses you and can even turn on you when you least expect it. It can be your friend one day and your enemy the next. — Alton Brown

If I am not safe in Alton, I shall not be safe anywhere. — Elijah Parish Lovejoy

Good service can save a bad meal, but there is no level of food that can save bad service. — Alton Brown

My advice: write down everything you eat. It's amazing what that "self honesty" can do for you. (Do you really want to have to confess that doughnut? I thought not.) — Alton Brown

'The Cardturner,' while it has bridge in it, you certainly don't need to know how to play bridge to read it. It's basically a book about relationships - between Alton and his great-uncle, and Alton and his friends, and how it changes his life. — Louis Sachar

The kitchen's a laboratory, and everything that happens there has to do with science. It's biology, chemistry, physics. Yes, there's history. Yes, there's artistry. Yes, to all of that. But what happened there, what actually happens to the food is all science. — Alton Brown

In the Mountains, they cooked, too.
Joe Godwin made liquor in Muscadine. Moe Shealey made it in Mineral Springs. Junior McMahan had a still in ragland. Fred and Alton Dryden made liquor in Tallapoosa, and Eulis Parker made it on Terrapin Creek. Wayne Glass knew their faces because he drove it, and made more money hauling liquor than he ever made at the cotton mill. He loaded the gallon cans into his car in the deep woods and dodged sheriffs and federal men to get it to men like Robert Kilgore, the bootlegger who sold whiskey from a house in Weaver, about ten minutes south of Jacksonville. "I could haul a hundred and fifty gallons in a Flathead Ford, at thirty-five dollars a load," he said. Wayne lost the end of one finger in the mill, but he was bulletproof when he was running liquor, and only did time once, for conspiracy. "They couldn't catch me haulin' liquor," he said, "so they got me for thinkin' about it. — Rick Bragg

I have concluded, after consultation with my friends and earnestly seeking counsel of God, to remain at Alton, and here to insist on protection in the exercise of my rights. — Elijah Parish Lovejoy

He is dangerous," Alton said, his voice rough.
She parted her lips to refute his claim. His heated gaze studied her mouth.
For a moment, she thought he wanted to kiss her. At the dining table. In front of her brother. Cook, who had just entered the dining hall with a tray full of fresh sourdough rolls. And one human prisoner. For one insane moment, she wanted him to. Kiss her. — Terry Spear

Stuffing is evil. Stuffing adds mass, so it slows the cooking. That's evil because the longer the bird cooks, the drier it will be. — Alton Brown

Everything in food is science. The only subjective part is when you eat it. — Alton Brown

Laughing brains are more absorbent. — Alton Brown

All [replacing of fat] does is lead to dissatisfaction and I think that dissatisfaction results in overeating. — Alton Brown

It's mind-boggling when you think about how important it is to do what you feel is right. You don't know what you'll be missing when you make a bad choice. — Jay Alton

Like Jesus said, "The kingdom of heaven is within," which seems, once and for all, to bust wide open the daft afterlife view of heaven as some kind of Lando Calrissian cloud kingdom that you can get into like Alton Towers if you acquire enough good-boy tokens. — Russell Brand

That's the ultimate goal of most turkey recipes: to create a great skin and stuffing to hide the fact that turkey meat, in its cooked state, is dry and flavorless. Does it have to be that way? No. We just have to focus on what the turkey is and what the turkey needs. — Alton Brown

When I turned the corner, I saw Toni waving at me from the elevator. I think I've already told you how it made me feel to see her smile and wave at me. You can have your sunsets and waterfalls. If a piano were to suddenly fall on my head, that's the image I'd want forever engraved in my mind.
- Alton Richard — Louis Sachar

Cooking is an observation-based process that you can't do if you're so completely focused on a recipe. — Alton Brown

Israel was thinking of warm beer, and muffins, and Wensleydale cheese, and Wallace and Gromit, and the music of Elgar, and the Clash, and the Beatles, and Jarvis Cocker, and the white cliffs of Dover, and Big Bend, and the West End, and Stonehenge, and Alton Towers, and the Last Night of the Proms, and Glastonbury, and William Hogarth, and William Blake, and Just William, and Winston Churchill, and the North Circular Road, and Grodzinski's for coffee, and rubbish, and potholes, and a slice of Stilton and a pickled onion, and George Orwell. And Gloria, of course. He was almost home to Gloria. G-L-O-R-I-A. — Ian Sansom

I love Alton Brown's show 'Good Eats,' about the chemistry of food. It's really thoughtful. — Ina Garten

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. — Alton Brown

I approach cooking from a science angle because I need to understand how things work. If I understand the egg, I can scramble it better. It's a simple as that. — Alton Brown

So on one hand, honey is an amazingly sophisticated and efficient food source. On the other hand, it's bee backwash. — Alton Brown

Well the artists that inspire me were, first of all I would say Sam Cooke, Otis Redding, John Holt, Alton Ellis, Errol Dunkley, Delroy Wilson and Dennis Brown you know. They have unique voice and sweet melody and you know, good lyrics those time yeh. The music was very nice in that time still seen, because you find that even the musical part, the musicians concentrate more on the melody than everything, more than how they concentrate on the money that time you Know — Gregory Isaacs

I looked for a very long time, knowing that it had to happen, but it took me a long time to find someone with the same background and whatnot and I finally found him. — Alton Brown

I think a lot of food shows, especially when we started 'Good Eats' back in the late '90s, they were still really about food. 'Good Eats' isn't about food, it's about entertainment. If, however, we can virally infect you with knowledge or interest, then all the better. — Alton Brown

I live an artistic double life: one of classical realism and the other of aesthetic exploration. — Alton Tobey

I had kicked around the idea for Good Eats when I was directing commercials. — Alton Brown

Every canvas that can awaken us more exquisitely and accurately to the infinite and various surface of our experience does that much to sharpen life, and thereby render it more alive. — Alton Tobey

I love poking fun at myself. I have a rather mean sense of humor. — Alton Brown

I grill almost all of my fish with the skin on because that gives you real protection at least on one side. It's a nice barrier against super high heat which tends to make a lot of fish to turn really flaky. It's very easy to overcook fish on the grill. But I still brush it with oil before I start. — Alton Brown

I spent a college semester in a small town in Italy - and that is where I truly tasted food for the first time. — Alton Brown

You don't want flame to hit your food. Flame is bad. Flame does nasty things to food. It makes soot and it makes deposits of various chemicals that are not too good for us. The last thing you really want to see licking at your food while it's on a grill is an actual flame. — Alton Brown

I can't talk about anything or write about anything if I don't understand it. So a lot of the stuff that I go through and a lot of the time that I spend is understanding. — Alton Brown

I have nothing but sympathy for the people who are forced to work with me. I'm better now at picking out those that want to play that game with me, and those that don't. — Alton Brown

My college degree was in theater. But the real reason, if I have any success in that milieu, so to speak, is because I spent a lot of years directing, I spent a lot of years behind the camera. — Alton Brown

If my wife made childhood obesity her mission and I signed a law making 1/8 cup of tomato paste a vegetable, I'd be sleeping on the sofa. — Alton Brown

The only unitasker allowed in my kitchen is a fire extinguisher. — Alton Brown

I think in the end there are only 20 or 30 tenets of basic cooking. It's going at perhaps the same issue from different angles, from different points of view, from different presentation styles, that really makes things sink in and become embedded. — Alton Brown

My first book is really about heat. That book, for me, was an exploration of heat as ingredient. Why we don't talk about heat as an ingredient, I don't quite understand, because it is the common ingredient to all cooking processes. — Alton Brown

Seriously. I'm not very bright, and it takes a lot for me to get a concept - to really get a concept. To get it enough that it becomes part of me. But when it happens I get real excited about it. — Alton Brown

I am a filmmaker. That is all I've ever been. You know, Martin Scorsese makes films about the mob. And I make movies about food. — Alton Brown

Take ice. Ice is fascinating to me. Ice is the one thing in our world that went from an agricultural product to being manufactured. — Alton Brown

I kept thinking, 'Somebody has to make a food show that is actually educational and entertaining at the same time ... a show that got down to the 'why things happen.' Plus, I hated my job - I didn't think it was very worthwhile. — Alton Brown

I was off the scene for a while during the ska period and when I returned and joined the Treasure Isle studio, I came there with a different mood. The musicians picked up on that and we kept on going in that direction. The music became slower, which gave the bass player the time to play more notes. In 1965 I named it rocksteady. The first rocksteady song was 'Girl I've Got A Date'. That one was still a bit up-tempo, leaning towards ska. It turned the tide and made Treasure Isle the number one studio. — Alton Ellis

Believe me, a grain is a terrible thing to waste. — Alton Brown

In the end, all journeys are spiritual. So go off the main road. Be givers of hospitality and gracious takers of it too. Accept the serendipitous moments of life because, when all is said and done, you may find out that they were not serendipitous at all. And know that faith is as real as bread broken among friends. What you believe will take you far on your journey. If you search carefully, you will find good food all along the way. — Alton Brown

The worst food you'll ever eat will probably be prepared by a 'cook' who calls himself a 'chef.' Mark my words. — Alton Brown

I say grace. I'm a big believer in grace. I happen to believe in a God that made all the food and so I'm pretty grateful for that and I thank him for that. But I'm also thankful for the people that put the food on the table. — Alton Brown

Laminated Lettuce ... perfect for holiday gift giving. — Alton Brown

Gluttony is wrong. It's wasteful. — Alton Brown

We are fat and sick and dying because we have handed a basic, fundamental and intimate function of life over to corporations. We choose to value our nourishment so little that we entrust it to strangers. This is insanity. Feed yourselves. Feed your loved ones. And for God's sake feed your children. — Alton Brown

A meringue is really nothing but a foam. And what is a foam after all, but a big collection of bubbles? And what's a bubble? It's basically a very flimsy little latticework of proteins draped with water. We add sugar to this structure, which strengthens it. But things can, and do, go wrong. — Alton Brown

You know we fixate on the food so much itself: "Oh, the ultimate brownie or the ultimate this or that"
well, let me tell you something: It's all poop in about 12 hours, okay? The real power that food has is its ability to connect human beings to each other
that's the stuff right there and, to me, everything else is secondary to that. — Alton Brown

Enough people have now mentioned Bill Nye the Science Guy to me that I now desperately avoid it all costs. — Alton Brown

I love to have battles of the wits with people that can dish fast and dirty - and it leads to problems occasionally, 'cause I can sound mean without attempting to be mean. — Alton Brown

In the Fragments, sensations are more profound and richly clarified through deliberate and explicit pattern; emotions are given a sequence and development such as the exigencies of practical life rarely permit. — Alton Tobey

The three phases of Santa belief:
(1) Santa is real.
(2) Santa isn't real.
(3) Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus. — Alton Thompson