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Not Fade Away

By Anthony Bourdain on February 22, 2009 11:26 AM | Permalink | 258 Comments

We're calling Monday night's show "DISAPPEARING MANHATTAN,, but this is not to suggest that Katz's Deli, or Keen's, or Russ & Daughters are going to fade away anytime soon (if ever). What I am saying with this "Special" episode is that these are exactly the kind of old school, hometown places I love; uniquely New York institutions who have survived the brutal caprices of style and changing tastes -- and are still worth going out of your way to patronize. Let me make this clear: "Old" does not necessarily mean "good." Just cause it's a "New York institution" doesn't mean you want to eat there. If it did, New Yorkers might actually eat at Tavern On The Green -- and Luchows would still be open.

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Not Fade Away

Without Pyramids

By Anthony Bourdain on August 22, 2008 9:52 AM | Permalink | 156 Comments

There's a marvelous scene in "Lawrence of Arabia" where Peter O'Toole, playing T.E. Lawrence, looks out at the vast, empty desert and says something like, " I like the desert. It's ... clean." And I've always admired that particular breed of slightly potty Englishmen -- the Arabists, cartographers, explorers, spies, scholars and mischief-makers--who fell in love with the 360 degree vistas of sand and sky they found in the Middle East. I saw that same love up close in the face of our Bedouin guide, who spends, he said, most of his time out there, roaring around in 4x4 vehicles with his buddies, sleeping under the stars, answerable to no one.

And I was happiest during my stay in Egypt sitting under those same stars, a fire crackling and throwing off sparks nearby, belly full of roast lamb, surrounded -- as far as the eye could see -- by nothing but the dark rises of an ocean of sand. But Cairo was another matter.

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Without Pyramids

Guns and Butter

By Anthony Bourdain on July 30, 2008 10:25 AM | Permalink | 279 Comments

I had the monster averaging 120 mph. Bugs bouncing off the windshield sounded like golf balls. Every once in a while, somebody would pull up alongside like they wanted to play. I'd tap the gas and leave them like they were standing still, find myself doing a rock solid 140 with plenty to spare. Back down to 80 when I'd see the bulls and it felt like 20. But the truly impressive feat of driving -- all across the deserts and highways of the great American Southwest, was performed by the tag team of Mike and Jared, in the production RV trailing behind.

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Guns and Butter

Politics and the Dinner Table

By Anthony Bourdain on July 26, 2008 9:41 PM | Permalink | 115 Comments

"Look," said Ali, an Egyptian/American chef, pointing at a plateful of traditional Alexandrian food in his Queens restaurant. "The history of the world."
He had just put in extraordinarily succinct terms what any well traveled eater, student of ethnic or national food ways -- or serious food nerd has come to know: that what is on your plate, the choice or selection, or preferences -- or ingredients -- almost any place you are eating, are the end result of movements of people and resources, the punch line of a story usually involving (at some point in history), deprivation, starvation, colonialism, slavery, greed, and warfare. No need for us to get all depressed about that.

The end result of the above -- at least (and only) as far as cuisine -- is more often than not, good.

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Politics and the Dinner Table