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Jacques Pepin

Jacques Pepin Quotes

Chef

Jacques Pepin is an internationally renowned French chef known for his exquisite culinary skills and his contribution to the preservation and innovation of French cuisine. Born on December 18, 1935, he grew up in a culinary family in France and later developed his career in the United States.

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Famous Jacques Pepin Quotes

“I taped my first series for PBS in 1982 at WJCT-TV in Jacksonville, Florida. The show, called 'Everyday Cooking with Jacques Pepin,' was about saving time and money in the kitchen - and it was a celebration of simple and unpretentious food.”

Firsts Shows Simple Tvs Cooking Series Everyday Saving Kitchen Celebration Florida Time And Money Pbs Saving Time

Author:Jacques Pepin

“When you are at home, even if the chicken is a little burnt, what's the big deal? Relax.”

Ifs Littles Home Bigs Deals Relax Chickens Big Deal

Author:Jacques Pepin

“I have an immigrant story. Most people come here for economic reasons, or religious reasons, or racial reasons, or gender reasons, or one of those things. I had a good job in Paris, but America was, and still is, the golden fleece. And I've done very well!”

People Wells Stills Reason Done Stories Jobs America Religious Economic Gender Golden Paris Immigrants Good Job Fleece

Author:Jacques Pepin

“I was chef to the French Presidents between '56 and '59, finished with de Gaulle, and during de Gaulle I remember serving Eisenhower, Nehru, Tito, Macmillan; those were the heads of state at the time. I never saw anyone. No one would ever, ever, ever come to the kitchen. You couldn't even see them.”

States Remember President Saws Finished Kitchen Serving Chef Head Of State Nehru Tito

Author:Jacques Pepin

“Most people who came here came for economic reasons or sometimes for religious or political reasons. I didn't have any of this. I came here, I liked it, I stayed. So I'm a pure American - even more than people who are born here - because I did it by choice as an adult.”

People Sometimes Reason Political Choices Born Religious Economic Pure Adults

Author:Jacques Pepin

“Probably a mistake, you know, that people make in America, to think that all great chefs are a male... I'm still the only male in the family who went into that business.”

People Thinking Knows Stills America Mistake Males Chef

Author:Jacques Pepin

“The idea of old was to conform yourself to a style of cooking, it was not to create a style of cooking. Now the chef is so much into 'I want to sign that dish and say I am the one who made that dish.”

Want Made Ideas Style Cooking Dishes Chef Conform

Author:Jacques Pepin

“Thirty, 40 years ago, more than that now, even, the cook was certainly at the bottom of the social scale. And any mother would've wanted their child to marry a doctor, a lawyer, an architect, not a cook. Now, we are genius, it's different.”

Years Children Different Wanted Mother Social Genius Years Ago Doctors Bottom Lawyer Scales Cooks Thirty Architect

Author:Jacques Pepin

“This is what a family is all about - one another, sitting around the table at night. And it's very, very important, I think, for the kid to spend time not only around the table eating with their parents, but in the kitchen.”

Thinking Important Kids Night Parent Eating Sitting Tables Kitchen End Times Spend Time Sitting Around

Author:Jacques Pepin

“When I left to go into apprenticeship in 1949, it was only four years after the war, and people don't realize, we still had tickets for butter, meat and so forth in France until 1947. It's not like the end of the war, everything was plentiful - it wasn't.”

People Years Stills War Ends Left Realizing Four France Meat Four Years Tickets Apprenticeship Plentiful

Author:Jacques Pepin

“You know, my parents had a restaurant. And I left home, actually, in 1949, when I was 13 years old, to go into apprenticeship. And actually when I left home, home was a restaurant - like I said, my mother was a chef. So I can't remember any time in my life, from age 5, 6, that I wasn't in a kitchen.”

Knows Years Said I Can Home Age Remember Mother Left Parent Kitchen Restaurants Chef Apprenticeship Home Home

Author:Jacques Pepin

“When you become a good cook, you become a good craftsman, first. You repeat and repeat and repeat until your hands know how to move without thinking about it.”

Thinking Knows Firsts Hands Moving Know How Food Cooking Cooks Repeats Culinary Craftsman Good Cook

Author:Jacques Pepin

“It's more useful to have knowledge about cuts of meat than a lot of money.”

Cutting Meat Lots Of Money

Author:Jacques Pepin

“Fortunately, I knew the cardinal rule of getting on with one's fellow cooks. It applies in any kitchen and can be summed up in two short words: bust ass.”

Two Fellows Ass Cooks Kitchen Cardinals Short Words Cardinal Rules

Book:The Apprentice: My Life in the Kitchen

Source: The Apprentice: My Life in the Kitchen

“The menus that remain, for me, are really the menus that you have with your good friends, with your wife, with your mother, with your kids. These are what stay in your mind.”

Mind Kids Mother Wife Good Friend

Author:Jacques Pepin

“When you'd get a note from someone, the government, it meant something was wrong. This was the way it was. Just goes to show you the way that being a chef has changed, you know - being on the bottom of the social scale and now being what we are, it's incredible, it's terrific.”

Changed Bottom Incredibles Chef

Author:Jacques Pepin

“Food can be utilized for economic reasons, like the grain embargo of Carter 40 years ago. You have a political decision, you are going to move the flow of food in a part of the world and not another part of the world. And certainly now, with the way the country is polarized and all that, you wouldn't want to have a French menu, with a French thing - you'd be crucified! Or anything like that. You have to be a real American and apple pie and this and that.”

World Real Country Reason Moving Political Decision Economic Grain

Author:Jacques Pepin

“My palate is simpler than it used to be. A young chef adds and adds and adds to the plate. As you get older, you start to take away.”

Young Used Add Used To Be Plates Chef Palate

Author:Jacques Pepin

“I say: If you don't know how to cook, I'm sure you have at least one friend who knows how to cook. Well, call that friend and say, 'Can I come next time and can I bring some food and can I come an hour or two hours ahead and watch you and help you?'”

Ifs Knows Wells Two Helping Next Hours Watches Know How Cooks Next Time One Friend

Author:Jacques Pepin

“If you have extraordinary bread and extraordinary butter, it's hard to beat bread and butter.”

Ifs Hard Beats Extraordinary Bread Bread And Butter

Author:Jacques Pepin

“One of the biggest problems with young chefs is too much addition to the plate. You put cilantro and then tarragon and then olive oil and then walnut oil or whatever. It's too much.”

Problem Young Too Much Oil Plates Chef Olives Olive Oil Walnuts

Author:Jacques Pepin

“Just because I am a chef doesn't mean I don't rely on fast recipes. Indeed, we all have moments when, pressed for time, we'll use a can of tuna and a tomato for a first course. It's a question of choosing the right recipes for the rest of the menu.”

Firsts Mean Moments Use Courses Rely Chef Recipes Tomatoes Menus Tuna

Author:Jacques Pepin

“My mother likes what I cook, but doesn't think it's French. My wife is Puerto Rican and Cuban, so I eat rice and beans. We have a place in Mexico, but people think I'm the quintessential French chef.”

People Thinking Mother Wife My Wife Likes Cooks Mexico Chef Rice Beans Cuban Quintessential

Author:Jacques Pepin

“This June, I'll travel once again to the Food and Wine Magazine Classic in Aspen, Colorado. For many years, my dear friend Julia Child and I have teamed up to teach classes together at the event; for the past seven years, my daughter, Claudine, has been my cooking partner on stage.”

“Cooking is the art of adjustment.”

Art Cooking Adjustment

Author:Jacques Pepin

“I cooked at the White House for Easter, last year, with Michelle Obama. But it more had to do with cooking from the organic garden, and her message. I took my daughter and granddaughter there, and they were really charming, it was great.”

Years Lasts House White Messages Daughter Garden Cooking My Daughter White House Last Year Charming Easter Granddaughter Grand Daughter Daughter And Granddaughter

Author:Jacques Pepin

“All the great chefs I know - Thomas Keller, Jean-Georges Vongerichten - they are technicians first.”

Knows Firsts Chef Technicians

Author:Jacques Pepin

“After 45 years of marriage, when I have an argument with my wife, if we don't agree, we do what she wants. But, when we agree, we do what I want!”

Ifs Want Years Wife Argument Agree My Wife Anniversary Years Of Marriage

Author:Jacques Pepin

“Basically, I go to the local farmer's market and decide to what to cook then, depending on what I find. Either my wife or I cook, and we usually finish a bottle or two of wine by the time we are done cooking and eating.”

Two Done Wife Eating Cooking Wine My Wife Locals Cooks Bottles Farmers Cooking And Eating

Author:Jacques Pepin

“Great cooking favors the prepared hands.”

Hands Cooking Prepared Favors

Author:Jacques Pepin

“I am a glutton. I'll eat whatever is there. Pizza. I love hot dogs anywhere. I've got nothing against any of that. If I feel like eating, I eat. I don't feel guilty about it at all.”

Ifs Feels Dog Eating Hot Guilty Pizza Hot Dog

Author:Jacques Pepin

“I tell a student that the most important class you can take is technique. A great chef is first a great technician. 'If you are a jeweler, or a surgeon or a cook, you have to know the trade in your hand. You have to learn the process. You learn it through endless repetition until it belongs to you.”

Ifs Knows Firsts Important Hands Process Class Students Trade Technique Endless Cooks Chef Repetition Surgeons Technicians

Author:Jacques Pepin

“I was born on the eighteenth of December, 1935, in the town Bourg-en-Bresse, about thirty miles northeast of Lyon, the second of three sons of Jeanne and Jean-Victor Pepin. Weighing only two and one half pounds, I nearly died at birth.”

Two Three Born Half Son Birth Died Towns Miles Thirty Pounds December One Half Weighing Three Sons

Book:The Apprentice: My Life in the Kitchen

Source: The Apprentice: My Life in the Kitchen

“You can't escape the taste of the food you had as a child. In times of stress, what do you dream about? Your mother's clam chowder. It's security, comfort. It brings you home.”

Children Home Dream Mother Security Comfort Taste Stress Clams

Author:Jacques Pepin

“When I pair food and wine, I start with the food. If I have a beautiful roasted bird, I might choose a Cabernet or Pinot Noir, or maybe a Syrah, depending on the sauce and what is in my cellar.”

Ifs Might Beautiful Bird Wine Pairs Sauce Noir Cellars Food And Wine Cabernet Pinot Noir

Author:Jacques Pepin

“When I wrote 'Fast Food My Way' in 2004, I hoped that my friends would prepare my recipes. Now, more people cook from that book than any other I've written in the past 30 years.”

People Way Years Book Past Written My Friends My Way Cooks Recipes Fast Food

Author:Jacques Pepin

“Children never lie...I remember my daughter standing in her crib the first time I gave her caviar. I put it on bread. She ate it and said, "Encore, Papa."”

Firsts Children Said Remember Lying Food Daughter First Time Standing Bread My Daughter Papa Never Lie Caviar Encores

Author:Jacques Pepin

“You have no choice as a professional chef: you have to repeat, repeat, repeat, repeat until it becomes part of yourself. I certainly don't cook the same way I did 40 years ago, but the technique remains. And that's what the student needs to learn: the technique.”

Way Needs Years Choices Students Years Ago Remains Technique Cooks Repeats Chef

Author:Jacques Pepin

About the Author

Born: December 18, 1935
Known for: Chef
Quotes: 38

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The Apprentice: My Life in the KitchenRelated source material

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