100 Quotes by Rick Stein

I like to have a few staff round for a glass of wine although if I'm feeding people I try and leave my glass alone, as it doesn't improve my cooking.

I've never worked in anyone else's kitchen, but at college there was a guy called Tom Chivers who was a great chef and I learned a lot from him.

It's no surprise that cream gives pleasure. It feels great when you eat it, and it makes you feel great, too. I read somewhere that cream increases the amount of serotonin you produce in your brain - serotonin being the chemical that makes you feel warm and comfortable inside.

Cream is actually tiny globules of fat held inside delicate membranes suspended in water - just like milk, only there are more globules.

Add a teaspoon of single cream, say, to a sauce just before serving to give it a touch of extra smoothness and depth. You also need single cream to float on top of Irish coffee. And you should probably use the finest unpasteurised double cream to make syllabub.

My first work space is my office in the cookery school in Padstow. It looks out over the Camel Estuary. I'm very lucky because I've got this office with the most fantastic view. I love looking out. There's always boats coming and going.

I have met vegetable growers who offer seasonal produce grown for taste rather than the ability to survive weeks in cold storage; meat producers who rear fantastic rare-breed pork, lamb and beef; and delis that stock local produce that will never find its way into supermarkets because it is not made in bulk.

I did have a very determined idea of making money. I was quite savvy about that. And that was my most basic lesson. You do have to understand the economics. It's pointless putting in all that work and losing money. If you're not making a profit you're stuffed.

The South Coast is not teeming with fish any more; there are no fleets of trawlers left. Small local boats land their fish daily and often sell it at the back of the beach, a scenario repeated all the way from West Bay to Whitstable.