Anthony Bourdain (1956–2018)

"If you are easily offended by direct aspersions on your lineage, the circumstances of your birth, your sexuality, your appearance, the mention of your parents possibly commingling with livestock, then the world of professional cooking is not for you."

Although I am what I would call an entry level "foodie," I'm not into food-related shows or celebrity chefs. For some reason, Anthony Bourdain caught a bit more of my attention than his peers before his death. There was just something about show more him.

When he intentionally ended this life, I became intrigued. Not in a morbid way. I just hoped to get a better understanding of what it is I had sensed and why he did what he did. So, I picked up Kitchen Confidential to see if I was right.

I'm glad I did! This was an enjoyable and insightful read. Eating at a busy urban restaurant will never be the same for me again...wow! I'd heard it was heavy on drugs and alcohol and high on stress, but Anthony opened my eyes wider. This is definitely not a habitat I would survive in...and, honestly, I have a difficult time understanding those who not only do, but who thrive in it.

Turns out I was right about Anthony. He was a sweet and sensitive man underneath his surly exterior — and, I can understand how the world was finally just too much for him.

Looking forward to reading Into the Weeds by Tom Vitale, Anthony's long-time director and producer. show less

By sheer happenstance, my husband and I spent June 8th on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, Tony’s home of many years (when he wasn’t traveling, which was rare). We were going to a concert in Brooklyn that night and decided to go the Met (Metropolitan Museum of Art) for the day. As we were driving to our “local” train station in NJ in rush hour traffic from our home west of Philadelphia, we listened to NPR, as we always do. And around 8AM, as we sat in Trenton traffic, we turned the show more volume up because we couldn’t believe what we had heard. Tony died. By his own hand. To my husband and I, this was unthinkable. We’d been watching No Reservations since we’d started dating. Our relationship had two television constants, Top Gear and Tony.

As we made our way into the city on NJ Transit as we’ve done countless times before, I took my usual news junkie status to a new level. My hero, he was gone. Gone without explanation. The BBC, CNN, NBC, ABC, NPR, no one had anything else to report except that which we already knew. He was gone. I texted my boss at the bookstore straight away and begged him to put the books in stock out on display with the staff pick blurbs I’d written for them ages ago. Medium Raw, my favorite summer read, Appetites, the only cookbook I cook out of, and, though I hadn’t read it, obviously we needed to order in Kitchen Confidential ASAP. Then I started dreading the fact that I’d be meeting with our publisher rep at the start of the week, the rep who handled his imprint for Harper Collins. I couldn’t bring myself to think straight.

I looked up whether or not we could get a reservation for a mid-afternoon meal at Les Halles, only to discover it had closed. Only months ago, we could have gone and didn’t. I kicked myself for it. When we walked past it later in the day, I saw the remembrances people had left. It inspired my first post two days later, Dear Tony. I debated whether or not I could bring myself to watch Parts Unknown anymore and when it turned out to be too tear-inducing, I decided to read the one book of his I didn’t want to, Kitchen Confidential.

I was afraid I wouldn’t like it. I was afraid it would talk too much about drug use and that I didn’t really want to read about, I’ve dealt with it enough in my family. I was afraid that the Tony writing was different than the Tony we’d come to know and love. And then, I decided to be brave and listen to him read it. I was on my way to London to visit my sister when I finally gave in. I still didn’t even own a copy of it. But after only five minutes, I realized I had nothing to worry about – Tony was still Tony – already a master storyteller, already with three novels to his name, already well on his way to not becoming, but staying himself, and then revealing that self to the world. And when I found a special edition of the book with all his notes and handwritten margin doodles at a bookshop in London, well, I had to have it.

Kitchen Confidential is, for anyone who has gotten to know Anthony Bourdain through his various shows, thoroughly him. The story isn’t linear or chronological (his never are, even Parts Unknown), and he is very open and honest about his periods of dishonesty and chef-poaching, honest about his privileged upbringing and squandering it, honest about the world of the professional kitchen. Honest and candid about his life and how he got to where he is, and the result, for anyone who, like me, had watched for years and never read, is heartbreaking.

Because in reading now, for the first time, it is impossible to disassociate the book with the end. It is impossible to ignore the fact that we will never have another Bourdain masterpiece. Impossible to forget that he’s no longer here to tell us stories on Sunday night. Impossible to understand how things went this way. Because as much as I wish I had known him, I didn’t. I didn’t know, I don’t know, what led him to do what he did. But I can read his works, reread, rewatch, and hope, beyond hope, that he has changed the world for the better. show less

Warning: Bad language appears in the following review. Blame the author.

Anthony Bourdain made a splash with Kitchen Confidential, which has allowed him to become the very person he so eloquently criticized in that book. With Medium Raw he explains everything, exhibiting the same lack of filter that made the earlier book so much fun. Except that now he's defending some of the people he previously hated. Don't worry, though; he still has enough anger and vitriol to keep things interesting.

On show more the other hand, his life now is much less interesting. He's a media personality instead of a chef and drug addict, which gives him less to work with. Oh, he does his best to be shocking, opening the book with a lavish description of eating an endangered animal and dropping the f-bomb like a pro. It's just that if you aren't passionately interested in how chefs are innovating, if Momofuku and WD50 don't ring any bells or if you don't have an opinion on foie gras, then this book will be a little boring for long stretches. And even if you're a huge Top Chef fan, this book is a far lesser book than Kitchen Confidential, although I can only be happy that Bourdain has managed to do so well for himself. He's an asshole, but one you wouldn't mind sharing a meal with. show less

Digital audiobook read by the author.
3.5***

Subtitle: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly

This is a wonderful memoir, as well as a bit of a tutorial, a travelogue, and a warning of what NOT to do. Bourdain is honest, profane, funny, enlightening and engaging. Some of his stories make me think I’ll never dine in a restaurant again. But most make me crave the experience of eating fresh ingredients prepared simply and deliciously by someone who really cares about the taste of the food being show more served. And, yes, Tony, I DO have shallots in my kitchen and I DO cook with butter! But, no, I do not make my own stock.

Bourdain narrates the audio version himself, and I cannot imagine anyone else doing a better job. 5* for his performance. show less