Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly

I'd never read anything of Bourdain's before and really didn't know that much about him until after his death, and I decided to start with his first book, which in retrospect was maybe a mistake for me personally? I can see why this was so popular and influential but it didn't do a lot for me personally. Like, I never got into Bourdain's career because I'm not super into like celebrity chef stuff, and then after he died I realized “oh he was more of like a travel guy than a chef guy really!” but this book was like Peak Chef Guy.

It's also interesting to think about how kind of the culture has changed–how Bourdain became so beloved partly for being non-shitty about other cultures and feminism and stuff, and you can kind of see it here where he talks about valuing the labor of undocumented immigrants but it's also still like....pretty toxic masculinity bro-y (despite his occasional applause for the tiny percentage of women who are ~tough enough~ to hack it in the kitchen).

Also he wasn't the best audiobook reader tbh–and I know this was his first one and he probably got more comfortable as a public speaker (or whatever) as he went on but this has a weirdly flat affect to it overall. (Some fun accents though.)

Anyway I might try again later with one of his more travel-oriented books or something. I am open to recs.

PS I'm NOT just saying all this because I'm a vegetarian but his disdain for my kind is NOTED lol