Making choices that are meaningful to you is the essence of the French woman’s secret.
Make treating yourself a priority and always remember your life is happening now. Don’t put off all your dreams and pleasures to another day. In any balanced personal definition of success there has to be a powerful element of living life in the present.
You and I don’t have the same genetics, we don’t live in the same places, but we can have the same basic attitude – being comfortable in our skin.
I find it so unattractive when women wear sneakers with their business suits. I wear a nice pair of loafers or low-heeled pumps, and that’s that.
I’ve never been ambitious.
Of course there are fat French women. There are fat people everywhere.
Once you have to start counting calories, it takes away from the joy of eating.
People are unhappy when they are on diets, because it’s ’don’t do this, don’t do that, do this, do that.
I cannot live without flowers everywhere. I grew up having a big garden, the size of a city block, in Rombas.
French women don’t have too many clothes – a few good pieces that last for a while and are classic and timeless.
Just as established products and brands need updating to stay alive and vibrant, you periodically need to refresh or reinvent yourself.
I can never leave a bookstore without buying a book. I read four or five at a time.
French women typically think about good things to eat. American women typically worry about bad things to eat.
French women eat and serve what’s in season, for maximum flavor and value, and know availability does not equal quality.
Give us being and feeling over having any day.
Learn to say no, with an eye to saying yes to something else.
One does not laugh because one is happy; one is happy because one laughs.
Wine is a living, breathing thing during its time in the bottle and in the glass. It is always changing, especially in the glass. A little oxygen can really open up and release the flavors in a complex wine, as well as mellow the rougher edge of immaturity.
The memory of some bottles can stay with your for life. While the wine doesn’t have to be old and rare, a great old bottle can be like a time capsule, capturing in its flavors and aromas the time and place of its creation.
Since the pleasure of most foods is in the first few bites, eat one thing on your plate at a time, at least at the start of the meal when you can concentrate and enjoy the full flavors.