Roy Choi Quotes - Page 2

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I don't have a boss. I don't answer to anybody. I do everything that I want to do out of the purity of making people happy.

I kind of feel for the vegetable world - the vegetarian world. It's almost as if people look at them like aliens or foreigners.

Cooking is not a craft to get into for money. The money may come, or it may not. But you must get into it for the craft and the culture.

There is no typical day, not when there are so many people out there that I care about that can't access good food in their neighborhoods.

Even as a kid I wasn't, like, a natural entertainer, where I would gather everyone around me and then sing or something at family parties.

It's so easy to produce food, throw it away, and watch people starve. It's so hard to produce food mindfully and to feed and to reduce waste.

The things that make Korean food delicious are garlic, ginger, soy sauce, sesame oil, chili powder, and chili paste. They make anything delicious.

Chefs have always been leaders, but now, because of social media and the evolution of the chef identity, we have a voice that expands beyond cooking.

With public television, they're making things that aren't driven by advertisers. They're one of the only platforms where we can really mine for truth.

I'm in a place where I feel comfortable not being a chef anymore. That's taboo in our industry. 'Chef' is supposed to be the ultimate end of the road.

American barbecue is all slow and low, you know, or low and slow, as they say down in the South, in Texas. But Korean barbecue is thinner cuts of meat.

When you have parents that come from a country that you weren't raised in, you feel this weird sense of familiarity, like you've returned to something.

What if every high-caliber chef told our investors that for every fancy restaurant we build, it would be a requirement to build one in the hood as well?

Why can I cook for tourists that come and visit L.A. and are so excited to see the Kogi truck? Because I cooked at country clubs and Embassy Suites hotels.

Food trucks are an essential part of people's days. They are important to the fabric of feeding people, like hotel chefs cooking breakfasts or for weddings.

I have a tendency to trail off in conversations. I don't look up at people sometimes when I talk or cook, and those are all pretty bad no-no's being in front of the camera.

Public television is a very important thing for our human race, and it allows us the ability to discuss the elephants in the room and understand stories beyond the headlines.

I know a lot of artists and chefs don't talk about this, but sometimes you just don't get to the finish line. That honesty and tenderness is something we're kind of not supposed to express.

For me, I never abandoned the truck. Even though I’ve opened other things, the truck is still the lifeblood of who I am. That’s because I enjoy it. I believe in it. It’s everything that I am.

I grew up around so many different people in so many different neighborhoods, but the Latino heritage, the neighborhoods, and people have always been a part of my life, ever since I was a kid.

A lot of times in television, you don't get the opportunity to show real life because we're brainwashed to believe the propaganda that these things aren't marketable, that these things don't sell.

I'm a little old-school in that I think there's some value in the classics and the steps of achieving a certain profession. If we start slanging the word 'chef' on anybody and everybody who cooks, it takes away a lot.

Go out one day and treat yourself. Go out and have the best sushi you can find, or go to the best barista in your city and have just a cup of cappuccino, and tell yourself that you deserve this. I think that is very empowering.

I know what it's like to be a teenager in Orange County. I know what it's like to be a kid in L.A. I know what it's like to not have any money and have your lights turned off. I know what it's like to live in a house with five rooms.

I translate Hawaii as a place where people make sure I'm having a great time, eating terrific food, without any expectation of anything in return. It's a place for people to be happy. It sounds corny, but in Hawaii, it's not; it's uncorny.

My parents and friends, they're Ph.D.s that worked as custodians, that owned their own businesses, that went bankrupt, that moved seven times, that sent their kid to Harvard, that don't have any money for retirement. Highs and lows of life.

I was a salary man for so many years. I never had to worry about the ins and outs of business or entrepreneurship or funding. I just had to show up and do my job. And then, all of a sudden, I was having to be responsible for my own business.

A lot of my friend's mothers and parents worked at Paramount Studios, so I would always go. I met the Fonz when I was really young, like four or five years old. I was always around people in entertainment all the time throughout my whole life.

There are certain foods that are somewhat sacred or you're not supposed to mess with. When you do mess with them, it touches a nerve where you have to compare it to the original, and then that thing you're creating has a loosing change right out of the gate.

I was watching TV and saw the 'Emeril' show, and it spoke to me. I went out and started researching the culinary world and chefs that I knew nothing about. Then I moved to New York and went to culinary school, and everything just fit like a glove. It's been on ever since.

A-Frame became an expression of creating a place where everyone would feel comfortable, even if you were made to feel uncomfortable in restaurants before. It's a place where I explored my own insecurities as far as being mistreated in restaurants or being given the worst table.

You have to believe in something, and you have to believe in the things that you feel and find value in those things, and not be swayed all the time. Maybe you're gonna get swayed 90% of the time, to keep those things submerged, but you can't distrust yourself 100% of the time.

Straight up, Oreos, sodas, chips, salsa dips, egg white omelets, yogurts, breads, ketchups, mustards, barbecue sauce, frozen pizzas, hot pockets, ice cream, all these things that you eat in your normal life - I think if chefs got more involved in that, then it could be better. Because we're the ones that know flavor.

I realized why I can cook for different environments. Because of everything I've gone through growing up. Why can I cook for a Hollywood event without blinking an eye? Because I cooked at the Beverly Hilton and because I moved to Villa Park. Why can I cook for kids on Hollywood Boulevard at night? Because I went through it.

I don't really do that much office work. I just go to the office, and I'm like Steve Carell in 'The Office.' You know, like, I just go around and like - I don't know what I do in the office. I look at paperwork and act like I'm understanding what's going on there, and I shake my head and put my hand on my chin and like, 'Hmm.'

I grew up around food and in a restaurant, so it never dawned on me that this was a thing to do; it just was. Then I found it as a profession in my mid-twenties after years of bad decisions and depression. The first step was going to the bookstore and learning about this craft. Then applying in kitchens and just getting to work.

My parents worked and sold and hustled; they were gone from the morning, and I pretty much took care of myself. But in a Korean household, you're always eating with your family no matter what, and you're always cooking. And our food is not one you can just open a package and eat right away; a lot of our food takes time to develop.

This is the premiere food symposium in the world. To quote you guys: 'Intended to invoke a sense of courage and urgency...Enabling this year's symposium to become a venue where we can reflect on the stories and ideas that no one usually gets the opportunity to tell.' So I stand here with the guts to ask you, please, let's do something. Let's do something and feed those that we're not reaching collectively.

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