Don't eat before you read this...
Last night I finished reading the fabulous Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly by Anthony Bourdain. This editorial review is worth the read:
Most diners believe that their sublime sliver of seared foie gras, topped with an ethereal buckwheat blini and a drizzle of piquant huckleberry sauce, was created by a culinary artist of the highest order, a sensitive, highly refined executive chef. The truth is more brutal. More likely, writes Anthony Bourdain in Kitchen Confidential, that elegant three-star concoction is the collaborative effort of a team of "wacked-out moral degenerates, dope fiends, refugees, a thuggish assortment of drunks, sneak thieves, sluts, and psychopaths," in all likelihood pierced or tattooed and incapable of uttering a sentence without an expletive or a foreign phrase. Such is the muscular view of the culinary trenches from one who's been groveling in them, with obvious sadomasochistic pleasure, for more than 20 years. CIA-trained Bourdain, currently the executive chef of the celebrated Les Halles, wrote two culinary mysteries before his first (and infamous) New Yorker essay launched this frank confessional about the lusty and larcenous real lives of cooks and restaurateurs. He is obscenely eloquent, unapologetically opinionated, and a damn fine storyteller--a Jack Kerouac of the kitchen. Those without the stomach for this kind of joyride should note his opening caveat: "There will be horror stories. Heavy drinking, drugs, screwing in the dry-goods area, unappetizing industry-wide practices. Talking about why you probably shouldn't order fish on a Monday, why those who favor well-done get the scrapings from the bottom of the barrel, and why seafood frittata is not a wise brunch selection.... But I'm simply not going to deceive anybody about the life as I've seen it." --Sumi Hahn
Having spent a great deal of time between the ages of 15 and 24 in and out of various restaurants from my first waitressing gig at Ponderosa Steakhouse to slinging shots at a college sports bar to serving in an upscale three-star independent joint (where I seriously toyed with the idea of leaving undergrad for the life of a pastry chef), I thoroughly enjoyed this book. It's a great read, even for those who don't know what an expediter or sommelier is, or one who may not be acutely aware of the difference between a CIA-trained chef and what you might find at Outback. Restaurant people, particularly those who choose it as their career work, tend to be an odd bunch, thrown together in hot kitchens, cold walk-ins, and well-stocked bars. I had insane, unchecked fun back then, and I have so many stories from those days, from lighting drink wells on fire for touchdowns scored, to being taught by a Kiwi in London how to draw shapes in the foam of a Guinness coming off tap, to picking up managerial slack from numerous alcoholic GMs, to learning how to pass insults in Spanish in order to gain the respect of the line cooks, to unknowingly sampling sauteed bull testicles with various sauces, and so many more. This book does a fine job of capturing the essence of life behind the kitchen doors in a dirty, sexy and utterly entertaining way.
Most diners believe that their sublime sliver of seared foie gras, topped with an ethereal buckwheat blini and a drizzle of piquant huckleberry sauce, was created by a culinary artist of the highest order, a sensitive, highly refined executive chef. The truth is more brutal. More likely, writes Anthony Bourdain in Kitchen Confidential, that elegant three-star concoction is the collaborative effort of a team of "wacked-out moral degenerates, dope fiends, refugees, a thuggish assortment of drunks, sneak thieves, sluts, and psychopaths," in all likelihood pierced or tattooed and incapable of uttering a sentence without an expletive or a foreign phrase. Such is the muscular view of the culinary trenches from one who's been groveling in them, with obvious sadomasochistic pleasure, for more than 20 years. CIA-trained Bourdain, currently the executive chef of the celebrated Les Halles, wrote two culinary mysteries before his first (and infamous) New Yorker essay launched this frank confessional about the lusty and larcenous real lives of cooks and restaurateurs. He is obscenely eloquent, unapologetically opinionated, and a damn fine storyteller--a Jack Kerouac of the kitchen. Those without the stomach for this kind of joyride should note his opening caveat: "There will be horror stories. Heavy drinking, drugs, screwing in the dry-goods area, unappetizing industry-wide practices. Talking about why you probably shouldn't order fish on a Monday, why those who favor well-done get the scrapings from the bottom of the barrel, and why seafood frittata is not a wise brunch selection.... But I'm simply not going to deceive anybody about the life as I've seen it." --Sumi Hahn
Having spent a great deal of time between the ages of 15 and 24 in and out of various restaurants from my first waitressing gig at Ponderosa Steakhouse to slinging shots at a college sports bar to serving in an upscale three-star independent joint (where I seriously toyed with the idea of leaving undergrad for the life of a pastry chef), I thoroughly enjoyed this book. It's a great read, even for those who don't know what an expediter or sommelier is, or one who may not be acutely aware of the difference between a CIA-trained chef and what you might find at Outback. Restaurant people, particularly those who choose it as their career work, tend to be an odd bunch, thrown together in hot kitchens, cold walk-ins, and well-stocked bars. I had insane, unchecked fun back then, and I have so many stories from those days, from lighting drink wells on fire for touchdowns scored, to being taught by a Kiwi in London how to draw shapes in the foam of a Guinness coming off tap, to picking up managerial slack from numerous alcoholic GMs, to learning how to pass insults in Spanish in order to gain the respect of the line cooks, to unknowingly sampling sauteed bull testicles with various sauces, and so many more. This book does a fine job of capturing the essence of life behind the kitchen doors in a dirty, sexy and utterly entertaining way.
posted by Amanda at 4:01 PM
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