What redeems him for me is his absolute passion for authentic food. But yeah, sometimes the New York jaded sex, drugs, rock-n-roll ennui get a bit much.
Yeah, that's the part of him that gets on my nerves.
And then he does something amazing. He gives some ancient, third world grandmama the puppy dog eyes and reverentially salutes her for her food, and she giggles behind her hand and gets as shy as a schoolgirl, and he completely redeems himself.
And I have to say that the fugu episode of A Cook's Tour is, for me, one of the classic television moments of all time.
He's kind of a bad boy--Food Network buried his series, "A Cook's Tour" either very late at night or Sunday afternoon when nobody's watching. But he's been on PBS and the Travel Channel over here as well. But that reputation for being sardonic and cynical--and very outspoken about his fellow chefs and the state of cooking in America altogether--keeps him pretty much under wraps by any enterprise actually interested in public relations.
He drinks a lot, smokes a lot, snarks a lot and can be completely hilarious...but has just enough warm fuzzy about him to keep you from throwing your shoe through the TV screen.
*laugh* Yeah, me too. I guess it's just... underneath that crusty Noo Yawkah exterior, he's got a big gooshy heart. His episode of No Reservations about Jamaica was the first time I ever saw the island I know from my childhood, the island with poverty and beautiful produce and dance halls and cool Blue Mountains and Black pride, in a travel show, as opposed to yet another ad for sunny tourist resorts. He got Jamaica right, in an open-eyed and respectful manner, and that won my heart. Well, that opened my heart -- the fact that he's done the same in other places won me.
I always love the ones he does in Southeast Asia and in South America, eating absolutely the most bizarre stuff you could imagine...
Stuff that people who live there eat.
Which is entirely the point of eating when you travel.
They have McDonald's in South Africa. Is that where I want to eat?
Oh hell no.
I know that some people feel safer when they have reminders of home around them, but I have to say that I share his attitude that part of getting to know a place is getting to know what people EAT there. And the fact that he's so good about eating damn near everything, whether he finds he likes it or not, indicates to me that he gets what it means to live in a colorful world.
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One of his upcoming spots will be here in my neck of the woods. I can't wait to see it.
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Ten minutes into it, I'm a freakin' squeeing fangirl.
It's sad, it really is...;-)
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And then he does something amazing. He gives some ancient, third world grandmama the puppy dog eyes and reverentially salutes her for her food, and she giggles behind her hand and gets as shy as a schoolgirl, and he completely redeems himself.
And I have to say that the fugu episode of A Cook's Tour is, for me, one of the classic television moments of all time.
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He has a book out called Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly that is actually quite popular here and which has the exposure of what really goes on in a restaurant kitchen as its claim to fame.
He drinks a lot, smokes a lot, snarks a lot and can be completely hilarious...but has just enough warm fuzzy about him to keep you from throwing your shoe through the TV screen.
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Stuff that people who live there eat.
Which is entirely the point of eating when you travel.
They have McDonald's in South Africa. Is that where I want to eat?
Oh hell no.
I know that some people feel safer when they have reminders of home around them, but I have to say that I share his attitude that part of getting to know a place is getting to know what people EAT there. And the fact that he's so good about eating damn near everything, whether he finds he likes it or not, indicates to me that he gets what it means to live in a colorful world.
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And the very LAST thing I'd want to talk about with him is food.
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