At my restaurants, we have training drills before every meal. We talk about what we did yesterday that was great and what we can improve today.

If someone said, 'You've got to eat your next two meals at American fast-food restaurants,' I would do one meal at Chipotle and one meal at Popeyes fried chicken.

People use restaurants to do business, to do politics, to socialize.

Diners are upset that restaurants aren't honoring reservations, and a lot of restaurants help bring this on by overbooking.

Restaurants and chefs have become followed by such a broad swath of the public, in a way that used to be reserved for sports stars, movie stars, and theater actors. Restaurants are in the firmament of today's common culture.

When the economy goes sour, there are three different kinds of restaurants that do well: the smaller-scale neighborhood restaurants that don't ask much of you; those that have banked enormous goodwill by offering great value during the boom; and those with proven records of excellence, a sure thing.