"Careful cooking is like writing. You have to find the exact word (or ingredient), to pare down (to get the essence of a flavor), to make seamless transitions (the compatible movement from one course to another). And then there is focusing, knowing what you are doing. One big difference is that Galway can put away a poem and go back to it again and again, sometimes for years, refining and perfecting it, whereas the chef is not allowed that indulgence. He has to get dinner on."

-Judith Jones, The Tenth Muse: My Life in Food