Medium Raw well done

 

Anthony Bourdain’s no-holds-barred expose of the seamier side of the restaurant business Kitchen Confidential was an eye-opener for readers, showcasing a drink- and drug-fuelled world where dodgy, slapdash work practices were the norm and food safety was an afterthought. Suddenly hundreds of thousands of people knew never to eat fish on Monday, and I’m sure that there were many who swore off eating in restaurants altogether.

A former coke and heroin addict, Bourdain is brutally honest in Kitchen Confidential about both his own failings and the restaurant business. Anger is never far beneath the surface of his writing and his scathing put-downs of high-profile chefs, food personalities and vegetarians can’t have failed to have got him into trouble at the time.

A lot has changed for the chef in the 10 years since Kitchen Confidential. For one thing he no longer cooks. Instead, he’s a globe-trotting TV personality, with his own show Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations and appearances as a guest judge on TV cooking show Top Chef; the sort of person who needs a personal assistant to keep his life in order. He’s been clean of drugs for years, and has even given up his three-pack a day cigarette habit since the birth of his daughter several years ago. He may still swear like the proverbial trooper and mouth-off at chefs and critics he hates, but overall Anthony Bourdain has mellowed.

Although a follow-up to Kitchen Confidential, Medium Raw is, like its author, a mellower animal altogether. There are moments, such as when an almost-suicidal Bourdain is driving drunk, way too fast, along an unlit cliff edge in the Caribbean, that hark back to the tone of the earlier book but it quickly moves to the present through a series of digressions and rants about the issues and people that move him (positively or negatively). A typical chapter is called “Heroes and Villains”, and consists of a list of high-profile chefs, critics and other food personalities who fit into each category (chefs Fergus Henderson and Jamie Oliver are heroes; Alain Ducasse is as a villain). Another chapter is called “Alan Richeman is a douchebag”. A third chapter called “So you wanna be a chef” speaks directly and sympathetically to aspiring chefs. Vegetarians come in for another drubbing.

Medium Raw is by no means a straight narrative but it is highly entertaining look at the contemporary food/restaurant scene, written as it is in Bourdain’s trademark Gonzo style. Descriptions of meals he has eaten take on a lusty porno quality, as he lovingly lingers over the taste and feel of every mouthful; profanity is common and even the best loved of food personalities is fair game. What's not to like?