Don't be afraid to adapt new ingredients into your own techniques, and traditional ingredients into new recipes.

My family came from Ecuador.

As long as you remember what you love and why you love it, it will never be far from your heart - or your plate.

I think that a lot of us at home are iron chefs in their own right in that we have to come up with meals real quickly.

I studied cooking in Spain after college.

From the time I was 8 until now, I've been working. My Social Security is looking solid.

Chicago is a lot of my background as a chef.

I spent several years cooking on a line.

I'm a huge fan of burgers, and they're not my wife's favorite, so we don't cook them at home.

Being Ecuadorian is, I don't want to say it's tough but it's... something special to me.

Well, you know, for me, I think Spanish food is festive.

And yet even in reaching for the beautiful there is beauty, and also in suffering whatever it is that one suffers en route.

Respect. Have it not only for others, but also for yourself.

You have to believe in yourself. That's the secret.

...We try to have things both ways. We’ve always refused to live by the book and the rule; but then why start worrying because the world doesn’t treat us by rule?

The gospel breathes the spirit of love. Love is the fulfilling of its precepts, the pledge of its joys, and the evidence of its power.

Every great dream begins with a dreamer.

The people definitely shape the two, put stamps and classify mainstream and underground music.

When I was growing up, my family was so poor we couldn't afford to pay attention.

Stefan Sagmeister says that nobody innovates past forty-five, but I think he's wrong. I want to keep doing it.

So long as we stand in need of a benefit, there is nothing dearer to us; nor anything cheaper when we have received it.