“Glasgow is maybe the most bullshit-free place on earth. I think I call it "the antidote to the rest of the world."
It's so unapologetically working class and attitude-free. Everyone's looking "to take the piss out of you," as they put it. They're all comedians, and tough. They don't put on airs.”
“O enchanted land of my childhood, a cultural petri dish from which regularly issues forth greatness. New Jersey, in case you didn't know it, has got beaches. And they're not all crawling with roid-raging trolls with reality shows. I grew up summering on those beaches and they are awesome. Jersey's got farmland, beautiful bedroom communities where that woman from "Real Housewives" who looks like Dr. Zaius does not live nor anyone like her. Even the refineries, the endless cloverleaves of turnpikes and expressway twisting and unknowable patterns over the wetlands that are to me somehow beautiful. To know Jersey is to love her.”
“There has ling been a happy symbiotic relationship between kitchen and bar. Simply put, the kitchen wants booze, and the bartender wants food.”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“I'm asked a lot what the best thing about cooking for a living is. And it's this: to be a part of a subculture. To be part of a historical continuum, a secret society with its own language and customs. To enjoy the instant gratification of making something good with one's hands--using all one's senses. It can be, at times, the purest and most unselfish way of giving pleasure (thought oral sex has to be a close second).”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“A sampler of England's hottest 'chefs' would include a mostly hairless young blond lad named Jamie Oliver, who is referred to as the Naked Chef. As best as I can comprehend, he's a really rich guy who pretends he scoots around on a Vespa, hangs out in some East End cold-water flat, and cooks green curry for his 'mates'. He's a TV chef, so few actually eat his food. I've never seen him naked. I believe the 'Naked' refers to his 'simple, straightforward, unadorned' food; though I gather that a great number of matronly housewives would like to believe otherwise. Every time I watch his show, I want to go back in time and bully him at school.”
Source: A Cook's Tour: Global Adventures in Extreme Cuisines
“In another telling anomaly of the meat-grinding business, many of the larger slaughterhouses will sell their product only to grinders who agree to not test their product for E. coli contamination--until after it's run through a grinder with a whole bunch of other meat from other sources...It's like demanding of a date that she have unprotected sex with four or five other guys immediately before sleeping with you--just so she can't point the finger directly at you should she later test positive for clap.”
Source: Medium Raw: A Bloody Valentine to the World of Food and the People Who Cook
“The whole concept of 'the perfect meal' is ludicrous.
I knew already that the best meal in the world, the perfect meal, is very rarely the most sophisticated or expensive one....Context and memory play powerful roles in all the truly great meals in one's life.”
Source: A Cook's Tour: Global Adventures in Extreme Cuisines
“Suddenly and without warning, one of the men stepped around and, with the beast's nether regions regrettably all too apparent, plunged his bare hand up to the elbow in the pig's rectum, then removed it, holding a fistful of steaming pig shit - which he flung, unceremoniously, to the ground with a loud splat before repeating the process.”
Source: A Cook's Tour: Global Adventures in Extreme Cuisines
“We knew well how much these people were paying for cocaine - and that the more coke cost, the more people wanted it. We applied the same market plan to our budding catering operation, along with a similar pricing structure, and business was suddenly very, very, good.”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“We are, after all, citizens of the world - a world filled with bacteria, some friendly, some not so friendly. Do we really want to travel in hermetically sealed popemobiles through the rural provinces of France, Mexico and the Far East, eating only in Hard Rock Cafes and McDonald's? Or do we want to eat without fear, tearing into the local stew, the humble taqueria's mystery meat, the sincerely offered gift of a lightly grilled fish head? I know what I want. I want it all. I want to try everything once. I'll give you the benefit of the doubt, Senor Tamale Stand Owner, Sushi-chef-san, Monsieur Bucket-head. What's that feathered game bird, hanging on the porch, getting riper by the day, the body nearly ready to drop off? I want some.”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“Prior Preparation Prevents Poor Performance, as they say in the army - and I always, always want to be ready. Just like Bigfoot.”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“Too lazy to peel fresh? You don't deserve to eat garlic.”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“Look at your waiter's face. He knows. It's another reason to be polite to your waiter: he could save your life with a raised eyebrow or a sigh.”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“Food, it appeared, could be important. It could be an event. It had secrets.”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“The life of the cook was a life of adventure, looting, pillaging and rock-and-rolling through life with a carefree disregard for all conventional morality. It looked pretty damn good to me on the other side of the line.”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“As a cook, your station, and its condition, its state of readiness, is an extension of your nervous system - and it is profoundly upsetting if another cook or, God forbid, a waiter - disturbs your precisely and carefully laid-out system.”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“Who's cooking your food anyway? What strange beasts lurk behind the kitchen doors? You see the chef: he's the guy without the hat, with the clipboard under his arm, maybe his name stitched in Tuscan blue on his starched white chef's coat next to those cotton Chinese buttons. But who's actually cooking your food? Are they young, ambitious culinary school grads, putting in their time on the line until they get their shot at the Big Job? Probably not. If the chef is anything like me, the cooks are a dysfunctional, mercenary lot, fringe-dwellers motivated by money, the peculiar lifestyle of cooking and grim pride. They're probably not even American.”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“What most people don't get about professional-level cooking is that it is not all about the best recipe, the most innovative presentation, the most creative marriage of ingredients, flavours and textures; that, presumably, was all arranged long before you sat down to dinner. Line cooking - the real business of preparing the food you eat - is more about consistency, about mindless, unvarying repetition, the same series of tasks performed over and over and over again in exactly the same way.”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“This book is about street-level cooking and its practitioners. Line cooks are the heroes.”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“The business, as respected three-star chef Scott Bryan explains it, attracts 'fringe elements', people for whom something in their lives has gone terribly wrong.”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“But that cold soup stayed with me. It resonated, waking me up, making me aware of my tongue, and in some way, preparing me for future events.”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“Everything was different now. Everything. I'd not only survived - I'd enjoyed.”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“The tone of the repartee was familiar, as was the subject matter, a strangely comfortable background music to most of my waking hours over the last two decades or so - and I realised that, my God... I've been listening to the same conversation for twenty-five years!”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“I believe celiac disease is a very serious ailment, and if you’re diagnosed with it, I’m pleased that there are now gluten-free options, but these people who are treating gluten as, you know, an equivalent of Al Qaeda are worrying to me.”
“So I didn't have time to craft artful lies and evasions even if I'd wanted to.”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“Early moralists who believed that taking too much pleasure at the table led inexorably to bad character-or worse, to sex-were (in the best-case scenario, anyway) absolutely right.”
Source: The Nasty Bits: Collected Varietal Cuts, Usable Trim, Scraps, and Bones
“Já estava acostumado aos amputados, às vitimas do agente laranja, aos famintos, pobres, garotos de rua de seis anos de idade que você encontra às três da madrugada gritando "Feliz ano novo! Olá! Bye-Bye!" em inglês, e depois aponta para suas bocas e faz "bum bum?". Estou ficando quase indiferente aos garotos famintos, sem pernas, sem braços, cobertos de cicatrizes, desesperançados, dormindo no chão, em triciclos, na beirada do rio. Mas não estava preparado para o homem sem camisa, com um corte de cabelo a la forma de pudim, que me detém na saída do mercado, estendendo a mão. No passado ele sofreu queimaduras e tornou-se uma figura humana quase irreconhecível, a pele transformada numa imensa cicatriz sob a coroa de cabelos pretos. Da cintura para cima (e sabe Deus até onde), a pele é uma cicatriz só; ele não tem lábios, nem nariz, nem sobrancelha. Suas orelhas são como betume, como se tivesse mergulhado e moldado num alto-forno, sendo retirado pouco antes de derreter por completo. Mexe seus dentes como uma abóbora de Halloween, mas não emite um único som através do que foi um dia, uma boca. Sinto um murro no estômago. Minha animação exuberante dos dias e horas anteriores desmorona. Fico paralisado, piscando e pensando na palavra napalm, que oprime cada batida do meu coração. De repente nada mais é divertido. Sinto vergonha. Como pude vir até esta cidade, até este país por razões tão fúteis, cheio de entusiasmo por algo tão...sem sentido, como sabores, texturas, culinária? A famíla daquele homem deve ter sido pulverizada, ele mesmo transformado num boneco desgraçado, como um modelo de cera de madame Tussaud, a pele escorrendo como vela pingando. O que estou fazendo aqui? Escrevendo um livro de merda? Sobre comida? Fazendo um programinha leve e inútil de tevê, um showzinho de bosta? A ficha caiu de uma vez e fiquei me desprezando, odiando o que faço e o fato de estar ali. Imobilizado, piscando nervosamente e suando frio, sinto que todo mundo na rua está me observando, que irradio culpa e desconforto, que qualquer passante vai associar os ferimentos daquele homem a mim e ao meu país. Dou uma espiada nos outros turistas ocidentais que vagueiam por ali com suas bermudas da Banana Republic e suas camisas pólo da Land´s End, suas confortáveis sandálias Weejun e Bierkenstock, e sinto um desejo irracional de assassiná-los. Parecem malignos, comedores de carniça. O Zippo com a inscrição pesa no meu bolso, deixou de ser engraçado, virou uma coisa tão pouco divertida quanto a cabeça encolhida de um amigo morto. Tudo o que comer terá gosto de cinzas daqui pra frente. Fodam-se os livros. Foda-se a televisão. Nem mesmo consigo dar algum dinheiro ao coitado. Tenho as mãos trêmulas, estou inutilizado, tomado pela paranoia, Volto correndo ao quarto refrigerado do New World Hotel, me enrosco na cama ainda desfeita, fico olhando para o teto com os olhos cheios de lágrimas, incapaz de digerir ou entender o que presenciei e impotente para fazer qualquer coisa a respeito. Não saio nem como nada pelas 24 horas seguintes. A equipe de tevê acha que estou tendo um colapso nervoso.
Saigon...Ainda em Saigon.
O que vim fazer no Vietnã?”
Source: A Cook's Tour: Global Adventures in Extreme Cuisines
“As an art form, cooktalk is, like haiku or kabuki, defined by established rules, with a rigid, traditional framework in which one may operate.”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“To want to own a restaurant can be a strange and terrible affliction. What causes such a destructive urge in so many otherwise sensible people? Why would anyone who has worked hard, saved money, often been successful in other fields, want to pump their hard-earned cash down a hole that statistically, at least, will almost surely prove dry? Why venture into an industry with enormous fixed expenses (...), with a notoriously transient and unstable workforce, and highly perishable inventory of assets? The chances of ever seeing a return on your investment are about one in five. What insidious spongi-form bacteria so riddles the brains of men and women that they stand there on the tracks, watching the lights of the oncoming locomotive, knowing full well it will eventually run over them? After all these years in the business, I still don't know.”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“But I'm simply not going to deceive anybody about the life as I've seen it. It's all here: the good, the bad and the ugly.”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“A vida de cozinheiro era uma vida de aventura, saque, pilhagem e rock’n’roll sem parar, com um desprezo displicente por toda a moral convencional. A vida do outro lado do muro parecia-me muito boa.”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“A restauração tem uma atitude bastante descontraída a respeito do sexo ocasional, e há bastantes empregadas simpáticas e bonitas, a maioria delas candidatas a atriz sem qualquer talento, para quem a relação sexual com tipos mais velhos e menos atraentes não é uma atividade completamente desconhecida.”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“It was not a pretty sight, all these pale, gangly, pimpled youths, in a frenzy of hunger and sexual frustration, shredding bread.”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“We should know. As citizens of the world, we should know what came before. How we got here. Why we do things the way we do them. Where are our food comes from. We should know what it was like for our humble predecessors, sweating and struggling in unrefrigerated larders, unventilated kitchens, the septic mad-house and twisting, low ceilinged subcellars of restaurants past. We should remember the way it felt, scraping potatoes into a garbage-strewn floor, scrubbing grease-caked pots with cold water, bending to the will of crazed and increasingly parsimonious masters. And we should understand not just how much has change, but how much has stayed the same: the character of the business we have chosen as a lifestyle -- the way people who do what we do have endured, have learned, have risen and learned to love this thing of ours.”
Source: Anthony Bourdain Quotes: Anthony Bourdain, quotes, quotations, famous quotes
“Just being able to talk about this issue...is a privilege, subsidized in a yin/yang sort of a way, somewhere, by somebody taking it in the neck”
Source: A Cook's Tour: Global Adventures in Extreme Cuisines
“I like cooking pasta. Maybe it's that I always wanted to be Italian American in some dark part of my soul; maybe I get off on that final squirt of emulsifying extra virgin, just after the basil goes in, I don't know.”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“Gosto de contar a pessoas selecionadas algumas coisas supostamente confidenciais, algumas vezes por semana, só pela piada. Mais tarde, quando essas histórias voltam para mim, fornecem-me um interessante mapa do percurso da transferência de informação, uma ingestão de bário, a revelar quem delata quem.”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“Não era isto que eu queria de um subchefe. Se os cozinheiros não o respeitavam, eu dizer-lhes que o tipo os podia despedir não ia criar esse respeito.”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“Todos nós estávamos a fazer inimigos entre muitos restauradores à medida que subornávamos, implorávamos, aliciávamos e induzíamos as pessoas a largar tudo e vir trabalhar para nós imediatamente.”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“A ideia era contratar para a minha equipa a maior quantidade possível de ajudantes leais – rapazes e raparigas que respondessem diretamente perante mim, em quem pudesse confiar para me protegerem a retaguarda – antes que o gerente da cozinha me impingisse os tipos dele, malta que não me diria nada se o meu cabelo estivesse a arder, e muito menos se havia alguém à minha espera com a faca pronta.”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“Já tinha visto gangsters antes, é claro, mas nunca tinha trabalhado numa casa que era completamente mafiosa, onde acabei por conhecer pessoalmente verdadeiros wise guys, cujos nomes saíam nos jornais. (…) Também não posso dizer que fosse um arranjo desagradável; pelo menos desta vez sabia que os meus cozinheiros iam aparecer para trabalhar todos os dias, porque se não fossem voltavam para a prisão.”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“Todos os dias acordava, ficava um bocadinho na cama, chegava ao trabalho – onde o serviço já ia a todo o vapor – e procurava alguém para ser despedido.”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“Era mais um agente funerário do que um médico; acho que nunca consegui salvar um único paciente. Estavam em estado terminal quando eu chegava; quando muito consegui prolongar-lhes a agonia.”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“Tinham sido três tentativas, três falhanços, três restaurantes. Felizmente ainda era novo, e portanto podia descansadamente culpar outros fatores pela minha baixa percentagem de sucesso: maus donos, má localização, clientes feios, decoração horrível… Não me incomodava. Ainda tinhas esperanças.”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“Pela primeira vez vi como dois tipos amados, divertidos e famosos podem acabar por ser menos amados, não tão divertidos e muito menos famosos por tentar fazer nada mais do que aquilo que os amigos lhes disseram que eles eram bons a fazer. Tenho a certeza que se desfizeram amizades. Amigalhaços leais deixaram de aparecer, causando sentimentos reais de traição e amargura. No fim, acho eu, todos nós os deixámos mal.”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“Abri o Post e vi uma fotografia da mulher do meu antigo patrão, enrolada no toldo de um restaurante chinês no Upper East Side. Parece que ela tinha executado um duplo salto a partir da janela do seu apartamento nas alturas e não conseguira chegar ao pavimento. Portanto, acho que afinal, não era assim tão feliz.”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“Qualquer sonho que eu pudesse acalentar sobre a magia de uma grande, famosa e elegante cozinha nova-iorquina foi substituído pelo orgulho triste dos expedientes criativos e pela satisfação técnica de ser suficientemente rápido para aguentar e safar-me com truques, mentiras e disfarces.”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“Muitas vezes, o restaurante original tem um conceito simples e fácil de perceber: um bar com bons pratos, um restaurante rústico italiano básico, ou um sítio pequeno, notório pela falta de pretensões. Mas o sucesso faz com que se sintam invulneráveis.”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“Uma frigideira de saltear como deve de ser, por exemplo, deve ser capaz de causar sérios estragos cerebrais se baterem com ela na cabeça de alguém. Se têm sérias dúvidas sobre qual é que se vai amachucar – a cabeça da vítima ou a sua frigideira – então atirem a frigideira para o lixo.”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
“Todas as grandes descobertas da cozinha tradicional, os primeiros tipos que comeram miúdos de vitela, ou experimentaram queijo Stilton não pasteurizado, ou descobriram que os caracóis afinal sabem bem com bastante manteiga de alho, eram todos temerários e inovadores, ou estavam desesperados.”
Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
