Bookopoly 2022. – Poll Pick
Buddy Readathon s Anom – 5

Volim Bourdaina. Često sam gledala njegovu kulinarsku seriju No Reservations i bio mi je šok kad sam čula da si je oduzeo život. Ovo je prva njegova knjiga koju sam pročitala i dala mi je neke odgovore na pitanje zašto je to napravio.
U knjizi nam Bourdain daje svoj svojevrstan kulinarski životopis. U njoj opisuje svoj život kroz ljubav prema hrani i prema kuharskom poslu. Ali opisuje ga zaista iskreno, sirovo, sa svim usponima i padovima. Opisuje svoje ovisnosti, svoje pogreške i kako je učio na njima. Opisuje ljude s kojima i za koje je radio, šaroliku hrpu kuhara iz raznih zemalja, bolesnike, čudake, luđake... Nekad je prost, nekad okrutan, a nekad s ljubavlju i zanosom pripovijeda o ljudima kojima se divi, koje cijeni. Pripovijeda nam o radu u kuhinji velikog restorana, o problemima, o naporima s kojima su se u njoj suočavali, o žuljevima, opeklinama, ubodima i posjekotinama. Do u detalje saznajemo što je čiji posao i što je on kao šef kuhinje sve morao raditi. A napose nam priča o ljubavi prema svom poslu, o onome što ga ispunjava i zašto voli ludnicu kuhinje kad se u restoranu pojavi milijun gladnih gostiju.
Knjiga mi je bila odlična i nadam se da ću je u budućnosti bar još jednom pročitati. Otvorila mi je vrata jednog novog svijeta i cijelo vrijeme dok sam ju čitala, pitala sam se kako izgledaju kuhinje naših restorana i ljudi koji u njima rade.

What follows is my summary of this book. Blah, blah, blah, drugs blah, blah, fuck everyone, pork chop, fuck you all, mince, veal, drugs, blood, blah, blah, blah.
Maybe you can tell, I am less than impressed. I don't feel too bad writing this review, because Bourdain certainly never minces his words (culinary pun intended;-) I was expecting entertaining anecdotes, but frankly I was bored most of the time and started skimming two thirds of the way through. Bourdain is eloquent and even charming, if quite wry, in his TV shows and I guess I expected more of the same here. That being said, this is an older book and I think he matured quite a bit since then.

Potpuno sam oduševljena ovim likom

It was really interesting to get an inside peek into the pressure and complexity of some of these kitchens that were plating for 200 to 300 customers a night. On top of that there was the wheeling and dealing, not only suppliers but with owners, bosses, drug runners and other associated people. It turns out that, in this industry, unlike many, its not what you know, but, *what you actually know* plus, who you know. People do not come back for mediocre food or service.

I would have loved to have eaten something dished up by Bourdain, it is astonishing what he knows about food and its preparation and I very much enjoyed these aspects of his book. However, my romantic notions of having lost yet another a great person to the tragedy of suicide, have simmered somewhat, down to a dull sauce. This guy was ambitious and creative, but he was also cruel and demanding and rude to almost everyone he crossed paths with. These are character traits that he himself reveals inside these pages. He is overly foul mouthed (I am pretty bad myself, I cuss like a wharvies daughter, but he is next, next, next level) to the extent that I needed to skip to the next paragraph quite a few times to avoid his macho, sexist talk. He admits it was bad, he was bad, everything was fucked, it was tough work keeping your reputation, finding your groove..... At the same time, he gives us insight into some of the most remarkable food that has ever been prepared and consumed. He talks about genius or near-genius chefs he has worked with, and how some of these people have become his loving, lifetime friends in which he has absolute trust and faith. An interesting book, which I have had on my shelf since June 2018. R.I.P. Mr Bourdain.

I am not, nor have I ever been, a foodie. I wish I was. I wish I had a more adventurous palette that loved encountering new things. But alas, such is not my lot in life. However, I’ve always loved cooking shows and food-based travelogues for reasons that honestly elude me. I still remember watching Anthony Bourdain’s No Reservations on the Travel Channel when I was in high school and losing myself in daydreams of exotic locales and finding my way off of their beaten paths and into locals-only areas. I thought Bourdain had one of the most fascinating jobs on the planet. Because of this, I was intrigued by his early life and decided to read my first ever foodie memoir about how he got started in the business.

“I've long believed that good food, good eating, is all about risk. Whether we're talking about unpasteurized Stilton, raw oysters or working for organized crime 'associates,' food, for me, has always been an adventure.”

Bourdain’s story was incredibly addictive. This was a no-holds-barred look at the industry and the people who populate it, written when such tell-all stories were far from the norm in the food world. I loved Bourdain’s honesty here, both about the kitchens and people who have such a huge place in his life and about his own failings. He didn’t try to show himself in a better light than he felt he deserved, and he had no qualms about confessing his own shortcomings. He also had no problem sharing the shortcomings of others or peeling back the curtains to let the outside world see the seedy underbelly of the food industry. I could have done without some of that knowledge, especially about certain hygienic issues, but the fun was worth the cringing.

“…your body is not a temple, it's an amusement park. Enjoy the ride.”

I love Bourdain’s passion for food and for the people who prepare it. He passionately praises the people he’s worked with, from executive chefs to busboys and everyone in between. If you’re passionate about your job and give it your all, Bourdain loved you. Also, I had no idea that drugs and sex were such a huge part of the food scene in the 70s and 80s, and reading about Bourdain’s escapades with his fellows in the industry was wild.

“Writing anything is a treason of sorts.”

What I wasn’t expecting was Bourdain’s writing chops. The man really knows how to string together words in ways that not only entertain but inform and transport the reader straight into the heat of the kitchen. With this book, Bourdain launched an entire subgenre of memoir. Food memoirs are now hugely popular, and I honestly don’t think those would be as prevalent or as honest had Bourdain not written Kitchen Confidential. (Side note: If you’re an audiobook fan, Bourdain narrates this himself.)

“I’m not going anywhere. I hope. It's been an adventure. We took some casualties over the years. Things got broken. Things got lost.
But I wouldn't have missed it for the world.”

Have I ever thought about chefs being the rock star, pirate equivalents of the culinary world? Nope. Will I think of them as such from now on? Probably not. But Bourdain sure as hell was a rock star in the food industry, and the world lost him far too soon.

You can find  this review and more at Novel Notions.

Abandoned, I think, most likely with prejudice.

The audio version is read by Bourdain, which may be the most problematic aspect for me. In the first couple of chapters, Bourdain discusses his introduction to the world of cooking, followed by his experiences at the Culinary Institute of America and his forays into the cooking world after. I'm stalled out on recommendations for the home chef chapter, which I'd kind of like to finish. Here's the trouble:

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 writing style is also somewhat over-done. It reminds me of when I was in high school and a group of us learned how to write humorous essays, that mostly consisted of wild exaggeration coupled with sarcasm. It's tiring.

The last part, and potentially most damning, is that there doesn't seem to be a lot of insight into food. Or rather, there was limited insight for the time period which it was about (remember truffle oil?), such as the infamous chapter with the advice 'never order fish on Mondays,' which he later amended (https://www.businessinsider.com/antho...). From a foodie perspective, he's focused on proteins and presentation: it was surprising to me that he recommended a solid chef's knife for the home cook, but not necessarily a paring knife (essential, imo, for delicate fruit and veggie work). And why does he hate the garlic press so much? Sure, for the first twenty-some years of my cooking life, I flattened and chopped with my chef's knife, but I confess the press I started using was perfect for garlic in homemade salad dressing.

Overall, I think I would benefit more from his last book, the one that potentially offers more insight from an older, more worldly person, and from his later-career focus in food as a representation of culture.

Profesyonel bir mutfak şefi olarak kitabın büyük bölümünde kendi hayatıma rastladım. Sektörde olmayanların abartı bulabileceği, bizim her gün yaşayıp normal karşıladığımız şeyler.

If Anthony Bourdain's stated goal in writing this book had been to convince the world that he is a vile, low-life, (hard-working!) scum bag, he couldn't have been more effective than what he actually came up with. Unlike Ruth Reichl's writing, Bourdain did not make me want to go eat something delicious, or even imagine what eating that delicious food might be like. Instead, he made me afraid of New York, anyone who has ever worked in a kitchen, and restaurants in general. Not afraid in the sense that I might unknowingly eat something disgusting (although he did seem to delight in sharing cost-saving secrets of the restaurant industry that make you, the diner, their chump), but just repulsed in general of the kind of person who apparently inhabits that world.
I honestly don't know why I continued reading this book. In fact, someone saw me reading it and asked if it was any good, and I went to lengths to warn that person AWAY from reading it (mostly because I worried what they would think of me if they cracked it open and discovered the filth I was allowing myself to wallow in.) So, anyway, unless you love Bourdain and also love having your stomach turned for you, I do not recommend you read this book.

Extremely well-written and surely a shocker at the time :)

My brother and sister worked various jobs in kitchens and I think were attracted to the dangerous eclectic people therein. I hate dangerous and most people so I'm glad this book exists so I can appreciate kitchens from afar! Though my interest lagged in the middle because I kind of expected the outcome of the each one-note loudmouthed bastard headclash. Also, if your job is so difficult, how 'bout do less drugs? But then the addiction is more to the lifestyle itself. "I can survive this difficult environment, which I find thrilling. Maybe I can ramp up the thrills and the difficulty." Thrills diminish, difficulty ramps up too high, crash, start again.

A lot of men like to tell me stories where they were in a new group of people who tested and berated them, and when they saw that the new guy could take the tests and the berating, they accepted him then and there, and forever after. Men in particular looooove these kinda tests. I hate them. Though I no longer disavow the legitimacy of these types of rituals. because I can objectively understand their purpose. Really they're to make sure people are trustworthy in teams that have to perform tough, unforgiving work together. Ie, jobs I probably couldn't do anyway. So I'd fail the test. Which is probably why I hate it ;)

Just an observation hahaha

Smashing book and great to see where and how Anthony got his start. It is a little repetitive as he goes from restaurant to restaurant learning his trade but the characters he meets along the way and just hearing his voice in my head as I read made it worthwhile and a good time.

“I’m asked a lot what the best thing about cooking for a living is. And it’s this: to be a part of a subculture. To be part of a historical continuum, a secret society with its own language and customs. To enjoy the instant gratification of making something good with one’s hands – using all one’s senses. It can be, at times, the purest and most unselfish way of giving pleasure (though oral sex has to be a close second).”

What a true delight it was to read my first Anthony Bourdain book! It was humorous, crude, exhilarating, mouth-watering, and highly informative. Oh, and I should mention, Bourdain may be a master at wielding a knife, but his skills with a pen aren’t too shabby either. I spent the past several days in his kitchens and dreaming about food and travel. (Well, I’m pretty much always fantasizing about these things, but let’s just say it became a bit of an incurable obsession of late!)

One thing is certain, I’m definitely on the right side of the kitchen – in the dining room! There’s no way I could cope working in this sort of an environment. The hours, the pace, the chaos, the pressure! But I admire anyone that can do it – and like Bourdain, I can see his point that “line cooks are the heroes.” I’m a firm believer now.

He takes us on a journey from his first realization that food was something more than just nourishment (when as an elementary student he tasted vichyssoise on the Queen Mary) through the various restaurants he inhabited for countless hours, to the heart of Asia where he learned that New York City was not the be-all and end-all of cuisine. The descriptions of certain food ‘encounters’ were probably some of my favorite morsels in the book. Bourdain’s experience with his first oyster was so vivid and tactile, sensual really, that I could well imagine it like it was my own. Such pleasure! It made me think of a certain scene from When Harry Met Sally. You know which one I mean.

“It tasted of seawater… of brine and flesh… and somehow… of the future… I had had an adventure, tasted forbidden fruit and everything that followed in my life – the food, the long and often stupid and self-destructive chase for the next thing, whether it was drugs or sex or some other new sensation – would all stem from this moment.”

I’ve never watched Anthony Bourdain’s shows. I didn’t really know much about him even five years ago – except that he was apparently some sort of deity in the food world. I’ve learned a bit more about him from reviews right on this site and became more and more interested in him, determined to glean more about his life. This book fit the bill perfectly.

If you’re not offended by honesty (and drugs and profanity and some ass-grabbing), and you’re not squeamish about what might go on before the wait staff brings those exquisite dishes to the table, then you may very well want to consider picking this up. The Afterword in my edition informs us that some things have changed in the restaurant world (namely the use of drugs and alcohol while on the job, the sexual antics during food service) since the writing of this book twenty years ago. I’m not going to lie – whether this is factual or not, I’m happy to erase some of those images from my mind when sitting down to enjoy a great meal! Nevertheless, I was greatly entertained and feel a lot more informed thanks to this.

It was a bit of serendipity to find out that Road Runner, the Bourdain documentary, was just released the other day! I’m pleased to say that the quaint little, locally owned theater nearby did not suffer a pandemic collapse. Its doors are once again open, and I plan to make a trip there very soon to watch this. I might even grab dinner before. But not at one of those chain establishments. Tony wouldn’t approve.

“Good food and good eating are about risk.”

“People confuse me. Food doesn’t.”

I loved this book when I read it.