"The Jewish religion has it completely right in maintaining you should think very carefully about what you eat."

“My dad was undeniably famous when I was a kid — he was on Wogan and Clive James and the radio every week, but as far as I was concerned he wasn’t famous enough. My best friend was Ben Brooke-Taylor. His dad Tim was in The Goodies — that was famous.”

“I wanted to be a great literary novelist so that people would eventually talk about Alan Coren the scribbler and father of the great Giles.”

“Some critics think the way I write is somehow disrespectful to food. But how can you write a restaurant column without being entertaining? You might as well not get up in the morning. People complain my sense of humour is puerile but the reason I have a job is because my sense of humour is puerile.”

“I am very snobby. My family is Orthodox so I would never go to a Reform rabbi.”

“I get so excited when I know I’m going to a good restaurant, then, when I do the review, I write myself up into such a frenzy that I have to go out and eat all over again.”