Anthony Bourdain Visits Chicago

Q&A with the bad-boy author, chef, and adventurer

Any advice for beginner cooks?

Julia Child’s Mastering the Art of French Cooking. When all else fails, go to Julia.

What’s your favorite movie about cooking?

I loved [Pixar’s] Ratatouille.

What was the last thing you cooked?

Wow, that was a while ago. I think I made spaghetti alla bottarga at home.

What kind of books do you read?

I’ll read anything from Elmore Leonard to Stendhal. I read The Quiet American every few years. I love Graham Greene. I love that spoiled romanticism, the failed Catholicism. I tend to like ex-Communists and ex-Catholics.

Your favorite drink?

If it’s late afternoon and I’m in Italy, I’d like an agroni, please. That’s a great cocktail. But if it’s late afternoon and I’m in an old-man bar in Dublin, then I would like a pint of Guinness. That’s food for the soul.

And on that note, your hangover fix?

At my age, nothing helps.

What is it like being on the road with your crew?

It’s a dysfunctional family. A kitchen crew is like being stuck in the same submarine every day. All you see is each other and your little world. These people I travel with, we’re much more like a band, year after year on the road. And instead of writing songs, we make shows.

What were your least favorite shows?

Well, I would say the infamous Uzbek massage scene [watch it here], wearing a towel the size of a cocktail napkin, being straddled by a Ron Jeremy look-alike, being pounded and twisted and stretched to within an inch of my life. The pain was so intense that I was completely oblivious to the sexual humiliation element.

What changes would you like to see in American food culture?

I think one of the worst things in American gastronomy was the idea of the 365-day a year tomato caprese. The sooner we can get away from that notion, that restaurants owe you tomatoes every day of the year, or that you should be able to get certain foods every day of the year, and we start living more seasonally, that’s a great thing.

How has No Reservations changed your perspective?

When I went out on the road for this show in 2006, knowing very little of the world, I honestly believed that people as a species sucked, and that given the change of a few points of economy, we would all turn on each other. There’s plenty of evidence to support that kind of thinking, but I can tell you, that having traveled all over the world, wherever I go, I can’t think of a country where I haven’t sat down and broken bread.

And I came away from that thinking that the world is basically full of good and decent people not that different from you and me doing the best they can under the circumstances. That’s a big change in my way of thinking.

Would you do anything differently?

Would I do it all over again? Yes. I would do everything exactly the same and I wouldn’t change a thing. I’m quite sure that if I could go back and confront myself at age 17, I’d ignore my own advice—from me. I cannot complain. Life has been very good. I’ve had at least 3 lives; I’m on a bonus round now.

• Displaying page 3 of 3
• «
• 1
• 2
• 3