Kitchen Confidential

The subtitle, Adventures in the
Culinary Underbelly, is very apt.
Bourdain makes frequent use of
simile and metaphor in his writing;
like a junior high boy, however,
all his comparisons refer to human
excretory functions and sex acts.
The book was strangely compelling,
yet ultimately not my cuppa tea.

I'd never read anything of Bourdain's before and really didn't know that much about him until after his death, and I decided to start with his first book, which in retrospect was maybe a mistake for me personally? I can see why this was so popular and influential but it didn't do a lot for me personally. Like, I never got into Bourdain's career because I'm not super into like celebrity chef stuff, and then after he died I realized “oh he was more of like a travel guy than a chef guy really!” but this book was like Peak Chef Guy.

It's also interesting to think about how kind of the culture has changed–how Bourdain became so beloved partly for being non-shitty about other cultures and feminism and stuff, and you can kind of see it here where he talks about valuing the labor of undocumented immigrants but it's also still like....pretty toxic masculinity bro-y (despite his occasional applause for the tiny percentage of women who are ~tough enough~ to hack it in the kitchen).

Also he wasn't the best audiobook reader tbh–and I know this was his first one and he probably got more comfortable as a public speaker (or whatever) as he went on but this has a weirdly flat affect to it overall. (Some fun accents though.)

Anyway I might try again later with one of his more travel-oriented books or something. I am open to recs.

PS I'm NOT just saying all this because I'm a vegetarian but his disdain for my kind is NOTED lol

i listened to the audiobook which is read by anthony bourdain so i think that added to my overall enjoyment of it but there's also a lot of aspects of it that i take issue with, also understanding that this was released in 2007

i don't know if his opinions on this changed over the course of his life but i was a little shocked at how proudly he seemed feel about running a kitchen on stress & shit talking & chaos, but that may be a product of the environment of professional kitchens. it also sat weird with me how he approached women in the kitchen, overall looking down on any genuine emotion & praising women that can “hang with the guys” aka put on a front of being okay with or comfortable with the sexual harassment that can occur, which again, product of the environment, but still feels very weird

as a home chef, i don't have the time, energy, freezer space, or budget to do things like make & freeze my own stock & only use fresh herbs. again, maybe his opinions changed later on but at this point he was not immune to the asshole bro chef ideology

i did really enjoy listening to his experiences though, he clearly knew his way around a kitchen & if you're interested in cooking, this may be worth the read/listen, but if you're not, you could go without