Food Read: Kitchen Confidential

My first "food book" of the year, and actually, my first book of the year, was Anthony Bourdain's Kitchen Confidential. Of course, being a devotee of both food and travel, I have seen my fair share of episodes of Bourdain's Travel Channel show No Reservations. Thus, it was but a matter of time before I picked up his writings as well. Though Bourdain wrote a couple of mystery novels prior, Kitchen Confidential was his first nonfiction piece, and I chose it because I wanted the most un-commercialized version of Bourdain I could find. Also, I was looking for a book that would give me a good, honest look at the life of a professional chef. I was not disappointed. Though Bourdain himself admits in the more recently written Afterword that, "Professional kitchens have become - for the most part - very different environments (at least at the top end) than the places described in the text," it is clear that much of the text still holds true. I would argue that even the aspects that have changed serve a purpose for the reader, particularly for one who did not live through the seventies and eighties in adulthood. It is easier to appreciate where we are, when we know where we have been. And how entertaining it is to learn about "where we have been" when Bourdain is describing it! Fans of his characteristic frank, rough, no-nonsense voice will be elated to find it here in quantity. Bourdain does not sugar coat anything - not the business, not the people behind it, not even his own sordid past. Indeed, he still seems to hold a certain amount of pride in many of the macho antics he describes, even while denouncing them in the very same sentence. To his credit, he does not get mired in stories of his "drug years" as many a writer can, and does. Rather, this book is all about the food. Often, he detours from the story of his journey through cooking in New York to give the reader advice. Don't eat fish on Monday. Don't eat in a restaurant with a filthy bathroom. Do invest in a decent chef's knife, a plastic squeeze bottle, and a metal ring. Use roasted garlic in your cooking. Never use "that vile spew you see rotting in oil in screw-top jars. Too lazy to feel fresh? You don't deserve to eat garlic." But the main message? Cooking is hard. Bourdain's goal in writing the book was to describe the world of professional cooking for what it is, and to caution all of us food romantics against letting things get too romanticized. Did he succeed? Well, I'll never hear the words "mise-en-place" again without thinking of his accounts of the kitchen "battlefield", "What? You don't got yer meez together...?" And you can bet that I will never take a career in food lightly, not that I would have before. Kitchen Confidential is a reality check for anyone who needs one. But for us food lovers, it can't help but leave us wanting more.