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Good asparagus needs minimal treatment and is best eaten with few other ingredients.

Marriage? It's like asparagus eaten with vinaigrette or hollandaise, a matter of taste but of no importance.

I love fresh vegetables and we always include them in our meals. I don't force my kids to eat asparagus, but they do eat peas, broccoli, and carrots.

It's a lot harder to get people to 'ooh' and 'aah' over beets and carrots than it is to get them to 'ooh' and 'aah' over artichokes or asparagus, and I enjoy being able to take these humble, 'lowbrow' foodstuffs up a few notches and serve them with great exuberance.

In Zurich, in a cafe overlooking the Limmat, I ate butter-drenched white asparagus pulled from the ground that morning; it had the aftertaste of champagne. I've been able to appreciate epic meals in San Francisco, New Orleans, Berlin, Paris, Las Vegas.

Gardeners are good at nurturing, and they have a great quality of patience, they're tender. They have to be persistent.

When thought becomes excessively painful, action is the finest remedy.

There is great force hidden in a gentle command.

I try to get them working. My older son is 10 and he's pretty interested. We had a dinner party the other night and he helped a lot. He helped peel asparagus; he hung out. It was great.