Nobu Matsuhisa

“I always eat a meal at home before I leave for the airport, so I only eat the soup and salad on the plane.”

“People eat the chicken, people eat the beef, they still say, 'Don't kill the fish.'”

“Peru was the Incas; it has 3,000 to 4,000 years of history.”

“Some hotels have a lot of mirrors, chairs, you can't find the plugs, the music is complicated. But the Nobu concept is beautiful, simple.”

“Shellfish is better to buy live. In the U.S., because we eat oysters and clams raw, it is very important that they are alive before we prepare them. It's important to look for a closed shell. If a clam is alive, the shell will be closed. Never buy clams if the shell is open.”

“When I was 11 or 12 - a young boy in Japan - one of my older brothers took me to a sushi restaurant. I had never been to one, and it was very memorable. Back then, sushi was expensive and hard to come by, not like today, when there's a sushi restaurant on every street corner and you can buy it in supermarkets.”

“A different spice is the most interesting thing to me.”

“I like both potatoes and rice. You can do a lot with both of them. But if I could eat only one carbohydrate for the rest of my life, I wouldn't choose bread, potatoes or even noodles. I'd go for rice instead; I eat more of that than anything else.”

“When I set up my first restaurant, I was so inspired by Wolfgang Puck, who is also based in L.A. and is now a good friend of mine, and the way he would engage with his customers and greet them personally.”

“You know how kids dream of being soccer players or actors? Well, my dream was to be a sushi chef.”

“Eating a lot on the plane is not good for jet lag.”

“In Japan, I have my own line of dinnerware, but I'm not aggressive about pursuing those projects.”

“One of my great loves is golf. When I am in L.A., I like to play with a few close friends: no phones, no distractions, the great outdoors and the chance to bet some money to keep it interesting.”

“Los Angeles is my home - I have my wife and two daughters growing up there.”

“Cooking and film are completely different - but I'd rather stay in the kitchen than be in movies.”

“In Tokyo, we have more three-star Michelin restaurants than Paris.”

“I'm not perfect. I am not Iron Man.”

“Napa cabbage is very beautiful, all those long, pale leaves with ruffled edges.”