Quotessence
Home / Authors / Amanda Elliot

Amanda Elliot Quotes

Author

Filter quotes by topic

AllJewish FoodFood For ThoughtFlavorsSeasoningsEntreesIngredientsSaladSeafoodTaste TestAppetizers

Famous Amanda Elliot Quotes

“The first course arrived before we'd even ordered anything. A potato chip on a tiny plate, heaped with glistening black pearls of caviar, topped with a spoonful of something creamy and white and speckled with something else pale and yellow. I loved caviar. This would be exciting if this single potato chip didn't probably cost, like, twenty dollars. "Bottoms up." Even though I wasn't technically reviewing this place---not my brand---I couldn't help but analyze the bite as I crunched down. The potato chip was one of the best potato chips I'd ever had, and let me tell you, I know my potato chips---it was shatteringly crunchy but not hard, still crispy beneath its layers of toppings, salty and savory and a little oily without being overly so. The white cream on top was rich and sour, the shavings of hard-boiled egg yolk on top softening its tart edges. But the star of the dish was the caviar, and it didn't disappoint. Each little bubble burst on my tongue with the essence of the sea itself.”

CaviarPotato Chips
Book:Best Served Hot
Create image

“But I also watched him closely, waiting to see that love of food. The surprised delight on his face when he took his first slurp of the brisket ramen, enjoying the tender shreds of savory meat, the chew of the crinkly noodles, the light but complex broth that hid the reveal of a plush matzah ball with a thick corn flavor. The concentration as he tried to place the flavor of the rub on the bowl of shredded carnitas that we portioned out ourselves and wrapped in marbled rye tortillas with tiny sour pickles and thinly sliced red onions and shreds of Havarti cheese. ("It's a pastrami sandwich," he murmured as he took the first bite.) The sheer pleasure as he closed his eyes while chewing the duck, rosy and meaty in the middle and crispy-skinned on the outside, in one perfect bite with pickled and fresh beets. I didn't have to look hard. It radiated out of his very soul.”

ExpressiveJewish FoodLove Of Food
Book:Best Served Hot
Create image

“He reached out and took my hands on the center of the table, pushing aside our mostly empty plates. His thumb brushed lightly over my knuckles, sending a shiver trembling from my wrists to my shoulders to my chest. "I want to keep things anything but professional," he said, voice low. It thrummed somewhere deep in my stomach. "I mean, unless you want to keep things professional." I traced my own thumbs over his palms. They curled reflexively up into my hands. "I want you to stop saying the word professional. And thinking it." I swallowed hard. Once I said this, there was no going back. But I didn't want to go back. "I don't want to keep things professional. At all." "Then we're in agreement," he said gravely. "To be unprofessional. Together." I nearly wrenched my shoulder from its socket waving to the waitress for the check. "No dessert tonight," I told her, trying not to look at Bennett's slow grin across from me. "I think we'll just have it at home.”

Sexual TensionUnprofessional
Book:Best Served Hot
Create image

“You really can't go wrong with the food at any Jewish holiday. Well, with the exception of Passover, because matzah is terrible and eight days of no carbs but matzah and potatoes can have you crying for pizza by the end. But think bagels and lox to break the Yom Kippur fast. All sorts of exotic fruits on Tu B'Shevat. Brisket and tzimmes and noodle kugel for pretty much any occasion. And that's only the Ashkenazi food; I'd been treated to Sephardic and Mizrahi food occasionally at friends' houses growing up, and I remembered fish cooked in spicy tomato sauce, tangines with chickpeas and saffron, Yemenite braided bread with whole eggs hidden in the twists. But Hanukkah food? Because Hanukkah celebrates the miracle of the oil, it's basically a mitzvah to eat fried foods for the holiday. And doing a good deed by eating French fries or doughnuts is the absolute best way to do a good deed.”

OilHebrewHolidaysHanukkahJewish FoodYom KippurPassoverFried Foods
Book:Love You a Latke
Create image

“You have to come try these banchan! Or I guess you've probably already tried them with your friend Sandy. But anyway! There's a kimchi made out of cucumbers stuffed with chili and onions and some kind of garlic chives? Whatever it is, it is amazing, and you must put it in your mouth right now!" I still felt bad about not answering the bartender. But when I turned back around to apologize or at least say something, he was off polishing a glass at the other end of the bar, conversing with one of the old men about the K-drama. So I went with her and put it win my mouth right then. And not just the stuffed cucumber kimchi. We ate seaweed salad with sweet vinegar, and crunchy sesame lotus root, and dried shredded squid with a spicy sauce, and steamed eggs, all with sticky white rice, and then we had bulgogi, thin grilled slices of marinated beef. It was all drool-worthy. I imagined I could taste Luke in every one: the extra shake of vinegar that took the seaweed right to the edge of being too tart but stopped just in time; the intentional lack of spice on the steamed eggs, necessary for a palate cleanser between all of the bright and spicy and sour.”

Korean CuisineSweet And Sour
Book:Sadie on a Plate
Create image

“She'd make all the ingredients individually for her kimchi-jjigae," he went on. "Anchovy stock. Her own kimchi, which made the cellar smell like garlic and red pepper all the time. The pork shoulder simmering away. And when she'd mix it all together..." He trailed off, tipping his head back against the seat. It was the first movement he'd made over the course of his speaking; his hands rested still by his sides. "It was everything. Salty, sour, briny, rich, and just a tiny bit sweet from the sesame oil. I've been trying to make it for years, and mine has never turned out like hers." My anxiety manifestation popped up out of nowhere, hovering invisibly over one off Luke's shoulders. The boy doesn't know that the secret ingredient in every grandma's dish is love. He needs some more love in his life, said Grandma Ruth, eyeing me beadily. Maybe yours. Is he Jewish? I shook my head, banishing her back to the ether. "I get the feeling," I said. "I can make a mean matzah ball soup, with truffles and homemade broth boiled for hours from the most expensive free-range chickens, and somehow it never tastes as good as the soup my grandma would whip up out of canned broth and frozen vegetables." Damn straight, Grandma Ruth said smugly. Didn't I just banish you? I thought, but it was no use. "So is that the best thing you've ever eaten?" Luke asked. "Your grandma's matzah ball soup?" I shook my head. I opened my mouth, about to tell him about Julie Chee's grilled cheese with kimchi and bacon and how it hadn't just tasted of tart, sour kimchi and crunchy, smoky bacon and rich, melted cheese but also belonging and bedazzlement and all these feelings that didn't have names, like the dizzy, accomplished feeling you'd get after a Saturday night dinner rush when you were a little drunk but not a lot drunk because you had to wake up in time for Sunday brunch service, but then everything that happened with Derek and the Green Onion kind of changed how I felt about it. Painted over it with colors just a tiny bit off. So instead I told him about a meal I'd had in Lima, Peru, after backpacking up and down Machu Picchu. "Olive tofu with octopus, which you wouldn't think to put together, or at least I wouldn't have," I said. The olive tofu had been soft and almost impossibly creamy, tasting cleanly of olives, and the octopus had been meaty and crispy charred on the outside, soft on the inside.”

Food For ThoughtFlavorsCuisineJewish FoodKimchiGrandmothers Love
Book:Sadie on a Plate
Create image

“As much as I really wanted to give the judges my take on gefilte fish (which was and is SO much better than that slimy, mealy garbage you get in the jar), obviously, that wasn't going to work for a vegetarian challenge. So what did I have up my----latkes! Of course. I hadn't made latkes yet. And I could easily gussy them up. I made an excellent version with parsnips to go with the normal potatoes and onions. I could make a fancy cream to complement it, and homemade cranberry applesauce, and make sure the edges were perfectly lacy and crisp...”

Food For ThoughtIngredientsJewish Food
Book:Sadie on a Plate
Create image

“How about lamb? I hadn't done anything with lamb yet, which was surprising, because it was one of my favorite meats. Lamb it is, then. Being in a restaurant kitchen and having to get dish after dish out, I probably didn't want to spend a lot of time pan-searing lamb to order. Too easy to get stuck in the weeds. So what if I braised it? In red wine, the way Grandma Ruth used to, and with spices like cinnamon and coriander and ginger, the way... well, not the way my grandma used to, but the way Sephardic Jews---whose ancestors had lived in Spain and North Africa during the Diaspora---did? Sephardic Jews also liked to pair meat with fruits. Dried fruits like apricots and prunes would be meltingly delicious cooked in the wine with the lamb; my mouth was watering just thinking about it. It would need some spiced couscous to soak up all those delicious juices, and maybe something salty. I had sweet, sour, umami, and bitter, so maybe something salty. Something pickled? Pickled cherries could make the whole dish pop.”

Food For ThoughtSpicesDiasporaEntreesLambJewish FoodDried FruitsSephardic
Book:Sadie on a Plate
Create image

“I really want my roots to come through in this meal," I said, very conscious of the cameras filming everything I was saying. "I want to make sure viewers and diners"----and investors, please, especially investors----"see everything that the food of my ancestors can be. That Jewish food isn't just matzah ball soup and pastrami sandwiches." So it was with that attitude I went about planning my menu. "I'm thinking my first dish is going to be a tribute to my grandmother," I said. "She was very into chopped liver. I hated it as a kid, for good reason: her chopped liver was bland and gritty." Grandma Ruth hissed in my ear, but I ignored her. "I want to make good chopped liver on good bread with something vinegary and acidic to cut through it. Maybe some kind of pickled fruit, because the judges really loved my pickled cherries in the last round." "How about kumquats?" suggested Kaitlyn. "Or gooseberries?" "I like gooseberries," said Kel. I made a note. "We'll see what they have at the store, since we'll be on a budget. With the second course, Ashkenazi cooking has so many preserved and sometimes weird fish dishes. Think gefilte fish and pickled herring. I've wanted to do my special gefilte fish this whole competition and never got a chance, so I think now's the time." "If not now, when?" Kel said reasonably. "Indeed. And I think coupling it with pickled herring and maybe some other kind of fish to make a trio will create something amazing. Maybe something fried, since the other two parts of the dish won't have any crunch. Or I could just do, like, a potato chip? I do love potatoes." I made another note. "And for the third dish, I'm thinking duck. I want to do cracklings with the duck skin and then a play on borscht, which is what the dish is really about. Beets on the plate, pickled onions, an oniony sauce, et cetera." "Ducks and beets play well together," Kel said, approval warm on their round face.”

Food For ThoughtTeamworkBrainstormingJewish Food
Book:Sadie on a Plate
Create image

“Kaitlyn's bread was still hot coming out of the oven; it emitted the most heavenly steam as she sliced into the golden crust. "The liver!" she called. Kel and I swarmed her, schmearing slices of toasted bread with the chopped chicken liver made with schmaltz---chicken fat---spicy and smoky with paprika and za'atar, and sweet with blackened, almost burned caramelized onions. I topped it with fried leeks and some microgreens.”

LiverChickenJewish FoodAppetizer
Book:Sadie on a Plate
Create image

“I loved these little teasers before a meal, things I didn't have to order but just came to me like gifts from heaven. These amuse-bouches actually looked like little gifts; they were small pouches of dough that twisted at the top and came to a gleaming golden-brown ruffle. They actually looked kind of familiar. "These were on Chef Supreme!" I said. I took a quick picture. "I wonder if they've got a sauerkraut and potato filling, like the ones Chef Sadie made on the show." I bit into it. The wrapper crunched and then relaxed into a nice doughy chew, almost like a very thin pizza crust. Sure enough, the interior was plush and buttery with a smooth potato puree but also zingy with fermented cabbage, the sour shreds of leaf providing a perfect contrast to the richness of the potatoes and the crust. "Remember when I told you there was no such thing as too much potato?" A mustard seed popped between my teeth, spicy. I finished with the ruffle on top, brown and shatteringly crunchy. "It's still true.”

PotatoesSequelJewish FoodAmuse BoucheKnishes
Book:Best Served Hot
Create image

“The chopped liver was smooth but just a little grainy, rich but with just a slight iron tang. The kimchi was sour and tart and crunchy and a little fishy, clearly the real thing. Piled together on a toasted slice of baguette and with a little extra richness from homemade mayo, it was an excellent bite. But not one that photographed all that well. Sure, the kimchi was bright red and pretty, splayed out like phoenix feathers, but the chopped liver was brown and mushy. I didn't think liver would get me all that many hits. Something that also tasted good but didn't photograph very well: the bite-size orbs of gefilte fish, the puree of who-knows-what soft and smooth, its pearly grayness flecked with orange bits of carrot. At least the vibrant beet and cardamom pickle on top, reminiscent of horseradish, looked nice.”

Social MediaLiverJewish FoodFood CombiningKimchiPhotographic
Book:Best Served Hot
Create image

“I pulled over my half of the latke appetizer. It seemed pretty simple, a lacy-edged potato pancake fried until plush in the middle and golden-brown around the crispy edges. Like nachos, the toppings were what really made it. The chef had played off the traditional latke toppings of applesauce and sour cream (#teamapplesauceforever), pairing her potato latkes with a spicy apple chutney, with chunks of both meltingly sweet cooked apples and crunchy tart raw apples, and a thick cucumber raita that reminded me of sour cream.”

ApplesJewish FoodApplesauceSour CreamLatke
Book:Best Served Hot
Create image

“I'm just not a glitter person," I was telling her as she led me back out into the main space, but the words stopped short when she shoved me in front of the mirrors and there I was, glittering at angle after angle. I almost didn't recognize myself. The dress was another simple A-line in shape, gathered at the bust and flowing past my waist to the floor. Its sleeves were loops that circled around my upper arms, baring my shoulders so that my hair could tumble over them or be tied up high to showcase the elegant flow of my throat into my clavicle, which I'd only just now realized was elegant. The dress was black--- my favorite color--- and covered with tiny chips of what must have been rhinestones, small and subtle and scattered enough where I didn't glow like a disco ball under the lights but instead shimmered whenever I moved. I looked like a princess of the night sky.”

Ball GownGlitteringBlack Dress
Book:Love You a Latke
Create image

“Oh my god," I said, because yes, Seth was breathing. He was also naked. Not totally naked, I realized a beat later. He had a towel wrapped around his waist. Which, come to think of it, explained why everything smelled like lavender. It also explained the beads of water clinging to the black curls scattering his chest and taut stomach and the thicker trail of black hair leading down beneath the towel---”

Naked ManHappy Trail
Book:Love You a Latke
Create image

“The train of thought went like this: I scribbled down the most "sophisticated" foods I could think of. Foie gras. Truffles. Expensive wine. Caviar. Ibérico ham. The one that struck a chord with my Jewish brain was caviar. Caviar served with blinis, little pancakes hailing from eastern Europe. In Russia they served blinis with caviar and sour cream. But even if I could make a hundred and fifteen blinis in the time allowed (since we had to make a few extras for beauty shots and mistakes), I couldn't just serve them with caviar and sour cream. That wasn't transformative enough. Original enough. What else was served with blinis? I tapped my pen thoughtfully against my Chef Supreme notepad. We were getting to the end of our planning session, and the way the others around me were nodding and whispering to themselves was making me nervous. Sadie, they all know exactly what they're doing, and you don't, I thought to myself. And then I nodded, confirming it. Jam. Blinis were served sweet-style with jam. But even if I made my own jam, that wouldn't be enough. I needed a wow factor. What if... what if I made sweet blinis, but disguised them as savory blinis? Ideas ran through my head as we were driven to the grocery store. I wasn't hugely into molecular gastronomy, but even I knew how to take a liquid or an oil and turn it into small gelatinous pearls not unlike fish eggs. I could take jam, thin it out, and turn it into caviar. Then what would be my sour cream? A sweetened mascarpone whip? And then I needed something to keep all the sweetness from becoming overwhelming. I'd have to make the jam nice and tart. And maybe add a savory element. A fried sage leaf? That would be interesting...”

Food For ThoughtJamCaviarGastronomyMolecularBlinis
Book:Sadie on a Plate
Create image

“Bennett reached for the fork first and scooped up a perfect bite of everything, which was a relief. A relief that turned into panic when he held the fork out toward me. Not for me to take---for me to take a bite. "For you, sweetheart." His eyes sparkled behind his glasses. I squared my shoulders. I could not believe this was happening. "Thank you, darling," I forced out, and let him feed me. My lips closed over the fork, Bennett watching the entire time. My face warmed again at the intentness of his stare on my mouth, but surely he was just watching to see when he could remove the utensil. The babka beignet was spectacular, light and fluffy and buttery, the chocolate filling dark and sweet against the tart brightness of the cherry. I parted my lips so that he could pull the fork back. His face was red again. Fortunately, he didn't make me feed him, just took a bite himself. Sadie asked, "So? What do you think?" "Delicious," he said, but he wasn't even looking at the dessert. He was looking at me. I couldn't even bring myself to answer. I could still feel the insistent push of his fork against my lips.”

FeedingDessertIntimate Act
Book:Best Served Hot
Create image

“My mouth watered. The lobster and waffles was extremely delicious, but I also loved the fancy toast topped with snow crab and avocado (rich, sweet, and textually balanced, given nice contrast by a zing of black pepper on top). And the soft-shell crab BLT, where the the sweet, earthy tomato met the crisp, watery crunch of the iceberg lettuce and thick, chewy smoke of bacon, and then the sweet, crispy crackles of the soft-shell crab. And Chef Stephanie's version of New England clam chowder, which was rich with cream, but not heavy, and delicately spiced; the clams were big and briny, and the bits of the bacon throughout somehow still crispy. It would have qualified as an excellent but not all that memorable clam chowder if not for the salsify root, which had the texture of a parsnip but the taste, almost, of an oyster or a clam. It made for a marvelously interesting bite.”

SeafoodFlavorsLobsterWafflesTastesSandwichCrabClam Chowder
Book:Best Served Hot
Create image