Anthony Bourdain
Anthony Bourdain
Anthony Michael Bourdainis an American chef, author, and television personality. He is a 1978 graduate of The Culinary Institute of America and a veteran of numerous professional kitchens, including many years as executive chef at Brasserie Les Halles. Although Bourdain is no longer employed as a chef, he maintains a relationship with Les Halles in New York. He became widely known for his 2000 book Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly. His first food and world-travel television show was...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionChef
Date of Birth25 June 1956
CityNew York City, NY
CountryUnited States of America
People everywhere have been very, very good to me, whether I'm with or without cameras.
When my father passed, I was still an unsuccessful cook with a drug problem. I was in my mid-thirties, standing behind an oyster bar, cracking clams for a living when he died. So, he never saw me complete a book or achieve anything of note. I would have liked to have shared this with him.
I'd like to play bass like Bootsy Collins. I'm serious. That would be my dream.
I'm a guy who should not have a lot of free time. But when it comes to vacation, I like to pull the plug completely. It's all about my daughter - I'm no longer the star of my own movie.
I'm not trying to explain other cultures, or to give a fair and balanced account of a country, or the top ten things you need to know. I'm not trying to spread world peace and understanding. I'm not an advocate or an activist or an educator or a journalist. I'm out there trying to tell stories the best I can.
Trying to micromanage the perfect vacation is always a disaster. That leads to terrible times. If you get lost and you just end up eating just anywhere, you know, you see a bunch of Venetians sitting around smoking cigarettes, eating something unrecognizable in a dark alley somewhere, chances are it's interesting.
When you're shooting that fast end to end, you wake up in a hotel and you don't know where you are. You're dreaming of Singapore, you wake up in Hong Kong. Or you just lose track. [It's] one of the reasons I'm staying in hotels that I know I've stayed in before, and they don't look like other hotels.
Is there a sharper commentary on American culture and the world than The Simpsons?
It would be an egregious mistake to ever refer to me in the same breath as most of the people I write about.
My mom had Julia Child and 'The Fannie Farmer Cookbook' on top of the refrigerator, and she had a small repertoire of French dishes.
People's choice to become vegan, from people I've spoken to, seems motivated by fear.
Is it a good hot dog? That’s all I want to know … I don’t think the personal health and purity of my colon is that important compared to pleasure. As a chef, I’m not your dietitian or your ethicist. I’m in the pleasure business …. My responsibility is to give you the most delicious tomato that I can afford, given the circumstances, and maybe increase the likelihood that you get laid after dinner.
Sometimes the greatest meals on vacations are the ones you find when Plan A falls through.
Always was Morocco. And recently the country's leadership seems to have embraced it in all its ill-reputed glory. The days of predatory poets in search of literary inspiration and young flesh are probably over for good. Hippies can just as easily get their bong riffs in Portland or Peoria. But the good stuff, the real good stuff, the sounds and smells and the look of Tangier -- what you see and hear when you lean out the window and take it all in -- that's here to stay.