Claire Chambers > Quotes

“The journey into love was so effortless and graceful; the journey out was such a long and laboured climb”
― Claire Chambers

“Most of us remember fondly our grandmothers' and mothers' kitchens but it can hardly be true that all of them enjoyed cooking. For most of history, and even today, cooking has not been a choice for women and, in the most extreme of cases, it has been the reason for their deaths. The luxury to be able to choose to cook is a class privilege. What to make of it, then?!”
― Claire Chambers, Desi Delicacies: Food Writing from Muslim South Asia

“There are perhaps few cuisines that demand as much time and patience as Pakistani food. We do have our quick karahis, balti goshts and tikkas, but the bulk of Pakistani cooking is a masterclass in patience.”
― Claire Chambers, Desi Delicacies: Food Writing from Muslim South Asia

“My grandmother smiled at Ammi's simplicity. My mother, with her university degree, had learned that the world existed In binaries of sanity and madness, and was caught between her faith, which believed in both sorcery and creatures that morphed into cats, and modern rationality, to which these were but
collective hallucinations.”
― Claire Chambers, Desi Delicacies: Food Writing from Muslim South Asia

“Jean felt an abyss come between them, but she didn't have the courage to reach across it. Let him come to her if he wanted to.”
― Claire Chambers

“chicken allah kaatey (chicken à la carte),”
― Claire Chambers, Desi Delicacies

“The cracks in the Pakistani glass ceiling have been slow to form, and they only materialize with a combination of education, class privilege and familial support. So, when women like me who have been afforded such immense privilege choose to step into the kitchen, we do it on the shoulders of entire communities.”
― Claire Chambers, Desi Delicacies: Food Writing from Muslim South Asia

“What a strange and fraught thing it is to be able to study and work and yet come back to the kitchen to preserve our heritage, to feed loved ones, to keep traditions alive, or simply to satisfy a craving.”
― Claire Chambers, Desi Delicacies: Food Writing from Muslim South Asia