Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly | Anthony Bourdain

Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly | Anthony Bourdain | The best

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Kitchen Confidenti...

	Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly Anthony Bourdain Bloomsbury USA, 2000 - 288 pages average customer review:based on 572 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

New York Chef Tony Bourdain gives away secrets of the trade in his wickedly funny, inspiring memoir/expose. Kitchen Confidential reveals what Bourdain calls "twenty-five years of sex, drugs, bad behavior and haute cuisine." Last summer, The New Yorker published Chef Bourdain's shocking, "Don't Eat Before Reading This." Bourdain spared no one's appetite when he told all about what happens behind the kitchen door. Bourdain uses the same "take-no-prisoners" attitude in his deliciously funny and shockingly delectable book, sure to delight gourmands and philistines alike. From Bourdain's first oyster in the Gironde, to his lowly position as dishwasher in a honky tonk fish restaurant in Provincetown (where he witnesses for the first time the real delights of being a chef); from the kitchen of the Rainbow Room atop Rockefeller Center, to drug dealers in the east village, from Tokyo to Paris and back to New York again, Bourdain's tales of the kitchen are as passionate as they are unpredictable. Kitchen Confidential will make your mouth water while your belly aches with laughter. You'll beg the chef for more, please.

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A great read!

It's amazing where writing talent is found. I originally discovered Bourdain via his "Les Halles Cookbook" -- one of the funniest cookbooks I have ever read. And then slowly, I began to remember -- hadn't this same guy written an earlier book, much more scandalous?

Well, this is that earlier book. You may not care for the tales it tells, or think very highly of the author, but the man writes like a god! Most of his best jokes are on himself, and all of the wimped-out sissy mistakes he made on the way to becoming a member of The Brotherhood, and its storyteller.

One of his bottom lines: "This stuff is EASY. My cooks are all recent immigrants from Latin America who had never tasted anything better than a taco in their lives. If they can learn, so can you."

It is also, for me, quite amazing to really sit back and think about a gang of five or six guys who actually manage to serve dinner to 600 people! Not once, but day in and day out! For this, you don't want no inspiration, you are not in the market for genius, man, you are a member of the freeping army/ballet corps, and everything depends on precise execution of tasks you have done a kazillion times before. (Oops, I slipped into quasi-Bourdain mode there.)

This book is really a lot better than Orwell's pretentious "Down and Out in Paris in London," especially when you learn that Orwell was basically a middle-class guy who volunteered to go slumming, and left when he got tired of it. This is not the case with Bourdain. This is HIS LIFE, and I for one really appreciate his gusto, his zest, and his willingness to work hard for what he wants.

Enjoy, enjoy (and don't order fish from a restaurant on Monday!)

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The best

Being in the restaurant business for 23 years I thought I had stories. I couldn't put the book down. I feel like I worked with him. This is a must read!!

No Reservations... this book is GREAT!

In reading this book, I could actually hear Anthony Bourdain's voice in my head. Since this was written prior to "A Cook's Tour" and "No Reservations" I felt as though I was getting the uncensored, ungroomed Tony Bourdain.

My ex-husband told me that I shouldn't read this book because if I did, I may never want to eat out again. Total crap. If anything, this makes me want to go out to eat more often, knowing how much work goes into preparing our meals. But the rule is simple, appreciate good food and the hands who prepare it and you can't go wrong.

It might be offensive to people at times, but overall I found it honest and entertaining. Adding it to my permanent collection of stuff to read over and over again.

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Yes and No....

Maybe because I am a chef I did not find the book hilarious as would probably a person who is not in the business. But, there were times when I found myself laughing out loud. Unfortunately, not enough times. I also found myself skipping paragraphs and a few pages. I did not find it boring but it was too cutesy of writing. I enjoyed how it showed his time line and if you put your mind to it you can succeed. After awhile I was tired of his long winded decriptions of whatever he was trying to describe. It was okay at first but then became trite. The book was 310 pages and it could have been successful at 200 pages. I had to nudge myself at times to get through. I enjoyed reading about his misadventures with incompentent owners which I could definitely relate to. Also, enjoyed the makeup of the different cooks.

I would be reading and enjoying the book and I would think to myself that I was being too harsh on the author when I would get to the next paragraph and I would see that my original opionion of it only being 3 stars was correct. I would reccommend this book to everyone because everyone has different tastes.

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