Kitchen Confidential: Insider's Edition

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To the extent which my work in Kitchen Confidential celebrated or prolonged a culture that allowed the kind of grotesque behaviors we’re hearing about all too frequently is something I think about daily, with real remorse.

No one understands the American Dream of hard work leading to material rewards more than a non-American,” Bourdain writes. “The Mexican, Dominican, and Salvadorian cooks I’ve worked with over the years make most CIA-educated [Culinary Institute of America] white boys look like clumsy, sniveling little punks.” There is little doubt that Bourdain understood that the “CIA-educated white boys” epithet applied to himself. Martin believes that Bourdain embodies many of the contradictions common to the group of driven male auteurs of his era, men like David Chase of The Sopranos and Simon, whose self-styled machismo and obsession with perceived authenticity could periodically obscure their well-intentioned progressive views. He sounds pretty much like a conceited, arrogant asshole, even as he's admitting he was a conceited, arrogant, twenty-year-old asshole. In this case, though certainly there is a feel of realism added by listening to him talk, it is far, far too much arrogance for me. I work with that type quite a bit, so I'm not really enjoying it during my free time.

The book is known for its treatment of the professional culinary industry, which he describes as an intense, unpleasant, and sometimes hazardous workplace staffed by who he describes as misfits. Best chapters in the book for me were the first few chapters about Bourdain's relationship with food. Bourdain eloquently describes the origin of his passion for food. In Kitchen Confidential, Bourdain does not share a lot of his private life nor emotions, and he is kinda hiding, or revealing himself metaphorically, through his trajectory of the professional life in the kitchen. In a lot of ways, the kitchen has all of the space in his memoir, much more than he himself has, or his private life and relationships. Reading this only now, in 2021, you could say I missed that gourmet meal when it was piping hot. The timing turns out perfect for that documentary that just came out, however, and I’ll try to watch Road Runner within the next few days. This wasn’t planned, believe it or not. I confess I'm a full-blown foodie. I love trying new restaurants, finding new things to eat that I've never had before. That moment, when you take the first bite of a never-before-tried dish and realize you've found a new favorite, it's one of the best feelings in the world. And Anthony Bourdain passionately embodied that. To read about his early days is an honor, and I'm glad I finally got around to it. Yup, food is sex. I can't trust people who don't enjoy food, who eat just to sustain their bodies and not for the amazing sensual pleasure that eating can be. Maybe its the French and Italian upbringing, but that's just not right to me. Love and fully experience your food! Giving someone delicious, lovingly prepared food is a profound act of love in my opinion. All these thoughts also apply to sex. Obviously.

I’m good. Im free, as it were, of the complications of normal human entanglements, untormented by the beauty, complexity and challenge of a big magnificent and often painful world.” While certainly it's a little eerie (and a little sad) to read a memoir by someone who subsequently dies, that didn't spoil my enjoyment of this terrific, brash, funny, and at times introspective, book. Bourdain was a natural storyteller—not only did he use food to tell the stories he (and his bosses) wanted to create, but he also loved to talk about the ways the culinary world has changed through the years, how what restaurants serve (and what people eat) has changed, and how the role of the chef has changed with it.In 2005, the book was adapted into a television show of the same name, starring Bradley Cooper as a fictionalized Bourdain. The series was cancelled partway into its first season, and only 13 episodes were produced. [6] Subsequent work [ edit ]