The most classic French dessert around the holidays is the Christmas log, with butter cream. Two flavors. Chocolate and coconut. My first job in the kitchen when I was a boy was to make these Christmas logs.

I avoid oily food and in fact my friends get mad at me as I don't have cake even on my own birthday. I do have a sweet tooth though for chocolates.

I never got a chocolate birthday cake; I got a carob one. And when I went to other kids' houses, I was very covetous of things like Cheez Whiz that I'd find in their refrigerators.

My parents screened 'Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory' for my 6th birthday, and I became fascinated by the idea of living in a candy land with chocolate rivers and lollipop trees.

All my grandchildren bake. On a Saturday, Annabel's boys, Louis and Toby, always bake. Louis makes a chocolate cake, Toby makes banana or lemon drizzle. They're 12 and 10, and they can do it totally on their own. My son's twin girls, Abby and Grace, are 14; they make birthday cakes and like to do it on their own with Mum out of the way.

Most of us have fond memories of food from our childhood. Whether it was our mom's homemade lasagna or a memorable chocolate birthday cake, food has a way of transporting us back to the past.

After about 20 years of marriage, I'm finally starting to scratch the surface of what women want. And I think the answer lies somewhere between conversation and chocolate.

I never do any television without chocolate. That's my motto and I live by it. Quite often I write the scripts and I make sure there are chocolate scenes. Actually I'm a bit of a chocolate tart and will eat anything. It's amazing I'm so slim.

Never start with a clear idea of storyline. Instead, commence blindly, with a vague notion of trying to include a reference to your favourite band, gift shop, or chocolate bar.

I have people in my life, of course. Some write; some don't. Some read; some don't. Some stare vacantly into space when I talk the geeky talk and walk the geeky walk, but they make killer chocolate chip pancakes and so all is forgiven.

The great correspondent of the seventeenth century Madame de Sevigne counseled, "Take chocolate in order that even the most tireome company seem acceptable to you," which is also sound advice today!

Oh! kangaroos, sequins, chocolate sodas! / You really are beautiful! Pearls, / harmonicas, jujubes, aspirins!

A lie, as you probably know, has a taste all its own. Blocky and bitter and never quite right, like when you pop a piece of fancy chocolate into your mouth expecting toffee filling and you get lemon zest instead.

What would you do if you only had one day left in this world? Spend it with the people you love? Travel to the far corners of the earth to see as many wonders as possible? Eat nothing but chocolate? Would you apologize for all your mistakes? Would you stand up to those you'd never had the courage to face? Would you tell your secret crush that you loved him or her? Why is it that we wait till the last minute to do the things we should be doing all along?

I think that there are those who write of life being a skip on the sidewalk, a chocolate bar, a bowl of cherries... the problem with that is it ends up disappointing people. Because life is more like being on the tube in London; you never really know what could happen! But then there are those people who bring a box of chocolates to eat on the tube...so life, it isn't a skip on the sidewalk, but it is a matter of strength: "Can I bring my bowl of cherries to feast on while I stand here in the gutter?" that's the essence of life. Can you still put on your rose-colored glasses while your eyes are filled with tears, and see everything in rosy colors? That's the strength that fuels a true life. Can you think to bring your little box of chocolates with you while you sit on the tube running under the streets of London? Because you should. Because even if you don't know anybody, and you don't know what's gonna happen next, you should have your box of chocolates with you. You should eat your bowl of cherries. And that is what life is.

"Children see God every day; they just don't call it that. It's the summer sky painted with cumulus clouds by day and sequined with a million stars by night. It's the sweet whispers of sweet gum trees and the sounds riding the tops of honeysuckle-scented breezes. Children feel God stuffed into brown fluffy dogs with stitches strong enough to withstand a good squeeze, and on the lips of round women who can't get enough sugar from Chocolate.

"You know, they've got these chocolate assortments, and you like some but you don't like others? And you eat all the ones you like, and the only ones left are the ones you don't like as much? I always think about that when something painful comes up. Now I just have to

Why should any guy want to be only friends with a girl? It's like agreeing to be near a chocolate cake and never eat it. It's like sitting in a racing car but not driving it.

Chocolate is God's apology for brocolli

Life is like a box of chocolates.

"Don't wreck a sublime chocolate experience by feeling guilty.

Number of empty Ben & Jerry's containers: 3 -- two mint chocolate cookie, one plain vanilla. (Who buys plain vanilla ice cream from Ben & Jerry's, anyway? Is there a greater waste?)

A good night sleep, or a ten minute bawl, or a pint of chocolate ice cream, or all three together, is good medicine.

All you need is love. But a little chocolate now and then doesn't hurt.