Food, Culture
& Civilization

Food
& Dining

Food, Gourmets
& Gourmands

Food
& Friendship

Food 
& Cooking

Food
& Ingredients

Food
& Cooks
(the celebration of)

We may live without poetry, music & art;

We may live without conscience and live without heart;

We may live without friends, we may live without books;

But civilized men cannot live without cooks;

He may live without books - what is knowledge but grieving?

He may live without hope - what is hope but deceiving?

He may live without love - what is passion but pining?

But where is the man that can live without dining?

- Owen Meredith, Lucile (1860)

Food, Culture
& Civilization

Food
& Dining

Food, Gourmets
& Gourmands

Food
& Friendship

Food 
& Cooking

Food
& Ingredients

Food
& Cooks
(the celebration of)

We may live without poetry, music & art;

We may live without conscience and live without heart;

We may live without friends, we may live without books;

But civilized men cannot live without cooks;

He may live without books - what is knowledge but grieving?

He may live without hope - what is hope but deceiving?

He may live without love - what is passion but pining?

But where is the man that can live without dining?

- Owen Meredith, Lucile (1860)

Food, Culture
& Civilization

Food
& Dining

Food, Gourmets
& Gourmands

Food
& Friendship

Food 
& Cooking

Food
& Ingredients

Food
& Cooks
(the celebration of)

We may live without poetry, music & art;

We may live without conscience and live without heart;

We may live without friends, we may live without books;

But civilized men cannot live without cooks;

He may live without books - what is knowledge but grieving?

He may live without hope - what is hope but deceiving?

He may live without love - what is passion but pining?

But where is the man that can live without dining?

- Owen Meredith, Lucile (1860)

Food, Culture
& Civilization

Food
& Dining

Food, Gourmets
& Gourmands

Food
& Friendship

Food 
& Cooking

Food
& Ingredients

Food
& Cooks
(the celebration of)

We may live without poetry, music & art;

We may live without conscience and live without heart;

We may live without friends, we may live without books;

But civilized men cannot live without cooks;

He may live without books - what is knowledge but grieving?

He may live without hope - what is hope but deceiving?

He may live without love - what is passion but pining?

But where is the man that can live without dining?

- Owen Meredith, Lucile (1860)

Food, Culture
& Civilization

Food
& Dining

Food, Gourmets
& Gourmands

Food
& Friendship

Food 
& Cooking

Food
& Ingredients

Food
& Cooks
(the celebration of)

We may live without poetry, music & art;

We may live without conscience and live without heart;

We may live without friends, we may live without books;

But civilized men cannot live without cooks;

He may live without books - what is knowledge but grieving?

He may live without hope - what is hope but deceiving?

He may live without love - what is passion but pining?

But where is the man that can live without dining?

- Owen Meredith, Lucile (1860)

Food, Culture
& Civilization

Food
& Dining

Food, Gourmets
& Gourmands

Food
& Friendship

Food 
& Cooking

Food
& Ingredients

Food
& Cooks
(the celebration of)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Food is the focus of some of the most important moments of our lives.
Eating and dining is a communal activity that is central to our social lives
both within the family and beyond.
It is over the dinner table that memories are made, deals are conducted,
pain is shared…we bond, we fight, we romance, we celebrate… 

Below are various food quotes which have been collated for your reading pleasure

Food, Culture and Civilization

“There are only two questions about food. Is it good? And is it authentic?
We are open (to) new ideas, but not if it means destroying our history. And food is history” 
– Guiliano Bugialli

“Do not dismiss the dish by saying that it is just simple food.
The blessed thing is an entire civilization in itself” 
– Abdulhak Sinasi

“The mere smell of cooking can evoke a whole civilization”
– Fernand Brandel

“Cuisine is the tactile connection we have to breathing history.
History and culture offer us a vibrant living society that we taste through cuisine.
All cuisine is a reflection of the society from which it emanates … 
in the end cuisine is the result of culture”
– Clifford Wright, A Mediterranean Feast

"The History of every major Galactic Civilization tends to pass through three distinct 
and recognizable phases, those of Survival, Inquiry and Sophistication,
otherwise known as the How, Why, and Where phases. 
For instance, the first phase is characterized by the question“How can we eat?,
the second by the question “Why do we eat? and the third by the question,
“Where shall we have lunch?”
- Douglas Adams

"The destiny of nations depends on how they nourish themselves."
 - Anthelme Brillat-Savarin

“Food is our common ground, a universal experience”
– James Beard

"The universe is nothing without the things that live in it, and everything that lives, eats."
- Anthelme Brillat-Savarin

“From earth sprang herbs, from herbs food, from food seed, from seed man. 
Man thus consists of the essence of food…From food are all creatures produced, 
by food do they grow…The self consists of food, of breath, of mind,
of understanding, of bliss.”
– The Upanishad

“A nation, though uncultured, may, all of a sudden or at times, produce a genius,
whether in art or in literature, but only a people of culture can have a good cuisine;
because the former is particuliar and transient, whereas the latter is general and permanent”
- F T Cheng (1954)

All animals eat, but we are the only animal that cooks.
So cooking becomes more than a necessity, it is the symbol of our humanity, 
what marks us off from the rest of nature.
And because eating is almost always a group event (as opposed to sex),
food becomes a focus of symbolic activity about sociality and our place in society.
- Robin Fox, Food and Eating, An Anthropological Perspective


Food and Dining

The pleasures of the table are for every man of every land,
 and no matter what place in history or society;
they can be a part of all his other pleasures and they last the longest to console him
when he has outlived the rest. - Anthelme Brillat-Savarin

“To eat is human, to digest, divine”
– Charles Townsend Copeland

The discovery of a new dish does more for human happiness than the discovery of a star.
- Anthelme Brillat-Savarin

  “In food, as in death, we feel the essential brotherhood of man” 
              – Vietnamese Proverb

“The table is the only place where one does not suffer, from ennui during the first hour.”
- Anthelme Brillat-Savarin

“…dinner is not what you do in the evening before something else. Dinner is the evening” 
– Art Buchwald

“Dinner is and always was a great artistic opportunity”
– Frank Lloyd Wright

“The art of dining well is no slight art, the pleasure not a slight pleasure”
– Michel De Montaigne, Essays 1588

“One cannot think well, love well, sleep well, if one has not dined well”
– Virginia Woolf

"Weddings, christenings, duels, funeral, swindlings, diplomatic affairs 
- anything is a pretext for a good dinner"
- Jean Anouith

“Eat to live and not to eat”
– Proverb

“Pleasure is divided into six classes: food, drink, clothes, sex, scent and sound.
Of these, the noblest and most consequential is food…
…the pleasure of eating is above all pleasures”
- Al-Baghdadi

"Pleasure in dining is the overall feeling that comes from the different 
circumstances of opportunities, places, things and persons which accompany the meal"
- Robert Courture (1755 - 1826)

“Laughter is brightest where food is best”
– Irish Proverb

"A man hath no better thing under the sun than to eat, and to drink and to be merry"
- Bible, The Old Testament

"Who loves not wine, woman and song, remains a fool his whole life long"
- Martin Luther

“From food do all creatures come into being” 
– The Bhagvad Gita

"There is no sincerer love than the love of food"
- George Bernard Shaw

Food, Gourmets and Gourmands

"Tell me what you eat, and I shall tell you what you are"
- Anthelme Brillat-Savarin

"Men who stuff themselves and grow tipsy know neither how to eat nor how to drink"
- Anthelme Brillat-Savarin

"A true gastronome should always be ready to eat, just as the soldier is always ready to fight"
- Charles Monselet

"Animals feed themselves; men eat; but only wise men know the art of eating"
- Anthelme Brillat-Savarin

"The Creator, while forcing men to eat in order to live, tempts him to do so with 
appetite and rewards him with pleasure"
- Anthelme Brillat-Savarin

"Good living is an act of intelligence, by which we choose things which have an 
 agreeable taste rather than those who do not"
- Anthelme Brillat-Savarin

"I am not a glutton, I am an explorer of food"
- Erma Bombeck

"He who does not mind his belly will hardly mind anything else"
- Samuel Jackson

"Who loves not wine, woman and song, remains a fool his whole life long"
- Martin Luther

"My mouth is a happy place"
- Pat Conroy

"I can resist everything except temptation"
- Oscar Wilde

Food and Friendship

"To invite people to dine with us is to make ourselves responsible 
for their well-being for as long as they are under our roofs"
- Anthelme Brillat-Savarin

“Friendships develop over food and wine”
– Prince Nicholas Romanoff

“We should look for someone to eat and drink with,
before looking for something to eat and drink”
– Epicurus 

“He who eats alone chokes alone”
– Proverb

“The perfect host puts his guest at ease”
– Travellers Tales – Food

“If you are ever at a loss of conversation, introduce the subject of eating” 
– Leigh Hunt

“Kissing don’t last : Cookery do!”
– George Meredith

“Great food is like great sex. The more you have the more you want”
– Gael Greene

“All people are made alike. They are made of bones, flesh and dinners.
Only the dinners are different” 
– Gertrude Louise Cheney

"Those who are one in food are one in life"
- Malagasi saying

“To the table or to bed, you must come when you are bid”
 - Laura Esquivel, Like Water for Chocolate

"Forks and spoons have probably done more to reconcile people who
cannot agree than guns and bombs ever did"
- Theodore Zeldin

"Strange to see how a good dinner and feasting reconciles everybody"
- Samuel Pepys

"There is no sight on earth more appealing than the sight of a woman
making dinner for someone she loves"
- Thomas Wolfe

Food and Cooking

"In cooking as in all arts, simplicity is a sign of perfection"
- Curnonsky (1872 - 1956)

"Cooking is a language through which a society expresses itself"
- Jean Soler, the Semiotics of Food in the Bible
 
“When love and skill work together, expect a masterpiece” 
– John Ruskin

“If you can organize your kitchen, you can organize your life”
– Louis Parish

“The torch of love is lit in the kitchen”
– French Proverb

“Cooking is like love, it should be entered into with abandon or not at all”
– Harriet Van Horne

"A meal is tasteless without a touch of fantasy"
- "Erasmus (1469-1536)

“The greatest dishes are very simple dishes”
– Escoffier

“I have the simplest tastes. I am always satisfied with the best”
– Oscar Wilde

Food and Ingredients

“Respect all food, and avoid it’s waste, because it is life itself” 
- Thomas Keller

"A meal is tasteless without a touch of fantasy"
- Erasmus (1469 - 1536)

“Rice and fish are as inseparable as mother and child” 
– Vietnamese Proverb

“Cheese – milk’s  leap towards immortality” 
– Clifton Fadiman

“Avoid fruit and nuts. You are what you eat” 
– Jim Davis, creator of Garfield

“A man does not live on what he eats, but on what he digests”
– Proverb

“The Hot Potato – the culinary equivalent of a big fat hug”
– Nigel Slater, Real Food

“Life is uncertain…  eat dessert first” 
– Anonymous

“…a big part of cooking is choosing the ingredients.
And a big part of serving is doing it with pride”
– Ruth Reichl

"Govern and empire as would cook a small fish"
- Lao Tseu

"How foolish is man to believe that abstaining from flesh, and eating
fish, which is so much more delicate and delicious, constitutes fasting"
- Napoleon Bonaparte

“Nothing will benefit human health and increase the chances for survival of 
life on earth as much as the evolution to a vegetarian diet”
– Albert Einstein

“The nearer the bone, the sweeter the flesh”
– Proverb

The way you cut your meat reflects the way you live”
– Confucius‘A meal without salt is no meal”
– Hebrew Proverb

“Sweet, sour, bitter, pungent – all must be tasted”
– Chinese Proverb

“Condiments are like old friends – highly thought of but often taken for granted”
– Marilyn Kaytor

“We are living in a world today where lemonade is made from artificial flavours 
and furniture is made from real lemons”
– Alfred E Newman

"A cook can never rise above his ingredients"
- Anonymous

“Eggs cannot be unscrambled”
– American Proverb

“Cauliflower is nothing but cabbage with a college education”
– Mark Twain

“The biggest seller is cookbooks and the second is diet books 
– how not to eat what you’ve just learned to cook”
– Andy Rooney 

Food and Cooks (& the Celebration of)

“The qualities of an exceptional cook are akin to those of a successful tightrope walker;
an abiding passion for the task, courage to go out on a limb
and an impeccable sense of balance”
– Bryan Miller

“Anybody can make you enjoy the first bite of a dish,
but only a real chef can make you  enjoy the last”
– Francois Minot

“Murder is commoner among cooks than among members of any other profession” 
– W H Auden

"After all the Cook, however good or bad, is an artist whose single vocations is to
make others lives happier.  He works only for pleasure of his fellows, twice a day, forever"
- Raymond Oliver

"Any master, who wishes to enjoy the rare luxury of a table regularly well
served in the best style, must treat his cook as a friend"
- William Kitchener (1821)

"Only in a society wherein people of culture and refinement inquire after their Cook's
health can the art of 'cuisine' be developed.  No food is really enjoyed unless is it keenly
anticipated, discussed, eaten, and then commented upon"
- Lin Yutang

'He was the founder of the art - he taught us first to practice astrology;
to follow that up immediately by architecture.  He had by heart all treatises on nature.
Capping it all came the science of strategy.'  That is, the Cook has to understand the stars
to follow the seasons, architecture to lay out the kitchen correctly, and military methods
to ensure proper order and timing.
- The Cook in the False Accuser by Sosipater

As a follower of Epicurus, the Cook follows the laws of nature.  As a learned Cook 
he must know what ingredients go together, 'for what possible good can come when
one individual quality is mixed with another and twisted together in an hostile grip?
Distinguishing these things is clearly a soulful art'
- Foster Brothers by Domoxemus

"Our lives are not in the lap of the gods, but in the lap of our Cooks"
- Lin Yutang, The Importance of Living (1937)