The Anthony Bourdain thread

"i'm with him, Alice Waters annoys the shit out of me as well"

She annoys the shit out of me too, but the line "I'm a little uncomfortable with legislating good eating habits" reveals that he has even less of a fucking clue than she does.

I think it's supposed to say "hey, Chicagoans know their food", but it's like saying "he's from Hawaii so he knows his surfing."

I honestly don't think I've ever heard anyone say "wow, those Chicagoans, they really know their food" -- the city usually gets those Wisconsin/German-style jokes about loads of sausage, beer, and cheese. But I don't think it's at all wrong, mostly for those major-urban-center / diverse-food-culture reasons; I mean, it's a big old thriving city, obviously lots of its residents are going to be relatively sophisticated about food.

"I honestly don't think I've ever heard anyone say "wow, those Chicagoans, they really know their food""

Really? I've always heard Chicago was a great food town.

yeah i mean i am not saying AB knows any better

chicagoans know their food, i saw it on SNL when i was a kid. the skit about those guys that had heart attacks while discussing their local football team. . .??

i've never had larger portions than i had in Chicago. that is for sure. i once got a salad (for under $10 w/ tax+tip) that could have fed a family of four for an entire day. and i'm a big eater too.

"I honestly don't think I've ever heard anyone say "wow, those Chicagoans, they really know their food""

Really? I've always heard Chicago was a great food town.

― Alex in SF, Wednesday, January 21, 2009 4:47 PM (12 minutes ago) Bookmark

Same here. Plus Bourdain is on record as being a proponent of a meat-centric diet, so I am not surprised he thinks highly of Chicago.

I feel like this was a running theme of Top Chef in Chicago, where certain contestants kept going "oh, these people are midwestern, they're not going to understand anything but fried meat" and certain judges kept going "you realize this is traditionally thought of as the third major urban center of the country and not some grand collection of rubes, right?"

It is a great food town -- it'd be hard for it not to be -- but I guess I rarely get to see people say it outright, since there are common assumptions to the contrary. But I guess if you're Bourdain you are used to talking in food circles where it's perfectly understood that Chicago's a good food city and doesn't have to be explained defensively.

Maybe he was referring to this:

Haha is he really on Check Please! What restaurant did he pick?

http://blogs.kqed.org/food/2009/01/06/check-please-barak-obama/

Nice, Dixie Kitchen! (Once upon a time there were three cold winter weeks in Evanston during which my girlfriend ordered Dixie Kitchen daily, compulsively and weirdly, and I think it says something good about Dixie Kitchen that it wasn't until the third week that I seriously got sick of it.)

chicago episode was pretty cool. L2O looked crazy!

The US Southwest episode sucked. Too much quirky shit, not enough food.

I thought Bourdain was going to move to Chicago after that episode.

I kind of liked Bourdain's visit to Ted Nugent's ranch. I call bullshit on Ted that that was his second beer ever. He's always said shit like that, but i guarantee he used to get high.

I can't stand Ted Nugent so I couldn't watch that episode. Chicago OTOH was pretty good.

The Ted Nugent part is at the end, so if you want, you can watch the boring first 45 minutes and then turn it off.

I had it on the background while I did dishes.

nugent has always been a dickhead sXe guy. always.

I was horrified to find out that Mancow and I have the same favorite movie.

I think among chefs and foodies, Chicago's reputation as a superior food town was sealed by guys like Charlie Trotter, Rick Bayless, and now Grant Achatz. Plus, the restaurant that Barack and Michelle go to for their anniversary -- Spiaggia -- was nominated for a James Beard Award for Outstanding Restaurant a couple years ago.

I think the two favorite meals that I've had in Chicago were at Avec and Hot Doug's so it was cool to see both of them there.

I was surprised there wasn't really anything about Mexican food at all, other than the sketchy tamale hotdog atrocities.

"I think the two favorite meals that I've had in Chicago were at Avec and Hot Doug's so it was cool to see both of them there."

Those were my two best Chicago meals too!

The mexican food here sucks. I know, I was surprised, too.

Haha Kenan I think that opinion says more about your lucky lack of exposure to sucky Mexican food than it says about Chicago

I grew up in a solid hard-shell tacos / Old El Paso seasoning packet / packaged shredded cheddar / canned black olives kind of Mexican food place so Chicago seems pretty decent Mexican-wise to me.

Could be. All I know is, the mexican food in Texas is fan-freakin'-tastic, and here it ranges from stomach-churning to meh.

Just out of curiosity, have you been to any of the upscale places (Frontera/Topolobampo, Salpicon, De Cero, Adobo), or are you basing that just on neighborhood taquerias?

I grew up in a solid hard-shell tacos / Old El Paso seasoning packet / packaged shredded cheddar / canned black olives kind of Mexican food place so Chicago seems pretty decent Mexican-wise to me.

You forgot the shredded iceberg lettuce.

http://www.aintnosurfintexas.com/zz%20top%20tres%20hombres%20mexican%20feast3%20copy.jpg

On my other favorite show, Diners Drive-ins and Dives, they went to a mexican place in Chicago that looked AWESOME called Puebla Cemita or something.

I like the actual diners, drive-ins & dives, but I cannot watch the pink fuckface on that show for more than a few minutes.

I've been to De Cero and Frontera and thought they were both decent but kind of disappointing. De Cero seemed to be taking itself to seriously and didn't live up to what they thought of themselves. Frontera was good and maybe was really innovative like 15 years ago when everyone thought Mexican food was hard shell tacos with iceberg lettuce but didn't seem all that interesting to me now. I also thought whichever of the three Pasaditas I went to wasn't anything all that great.

But I've really liked Taqueria Moran every time I've been there - which admittedly I was either starving or hung over or with lots of friends so that may cloud it.

Frontera/Topolobampo

Oh man, Rick Bayless's places are amazing. Really killer stuff. I guess that's not what I meant by Mexican food -- I took my Dad to Frontera once while he was in town, promising great Mexican food, and I could see the puzzlement on his face as he looked at the menu. "Where's the giant bowl of queso?" So I guess I put that in another category, even though maybe I shouldn't.

jinky: best. gatefold. ever.

"Where's the giant bowl of queso?"

uh

I don't want to get into a whole Mexican thing, because we've done it before a whole bunch of different times, but lookit: I occasionally felt like Chicago's Mexican was lacking compared to the tasty southwestern stuff I grew up on (which is a whole different kind of food in the first place), but honestly, compared to almost any place else in this country, it is generally decent and nothing to complain about. Honestly. Seriously. Up until I found a good southwestern-style place here in New York, I'd have killed for even the kind of stuff you can get at Flash Taco.

(I would also submit -- from personal experience! -- that if you're really used to Texan or "southwestern" Mexican, you can get to a point where someone gives you certain types of authentic Mexican food and you're like OMG this is terrible, given that it's a big country and many parts of it are not gussying up their dishes with as much first-world richness and stewing and cheese as parts of ours.)

haha xpost! -- the parenthetical bit above = "where's the giant bowl of queso" EXACTLY

yeah, if i can get some tacos with tasty carne al pastor, cilantro, onions, and spicy salsa, then i'm happy. no queso necessary.

(i realize that the tex-mex thing is totally different, and i'm not that familiar with it)

You're making me so so hungry for things covered in red sauce and melted cheese.

That whole southwestern-vs-authentic thing once led to a really embarrassing conversation between me and another ILXor, about a local restaurant:

ME: Everything seems really weird and thrown-together there.
HIM: It's pretty much just authentic Oaxacan style.
ME: No way, they just throw that runny white cream on everything!
HIM: I believe that's known as Oaxaca Cream.
ME: Well they're definitely using some kind of cheap, bland cheese.
HIM: Yeah, that's called Oaxaca Cheese.

i hate that white cheese

so do they really provide big bowls of cheese at tex-mex places?

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/6/65/Queso.jpg/400px-Queso.jpg

I have never seen such a thing.

I've never seen anything like that in my life.

Not saying I wouldn't down the whole thing, just saying.

so basically Chicago mexican is more authentic than Austin/SATX mexican?

Queso is amazing.

so basically Chicago mexican is more authentic than Austin/SATX mexican?

well, "authentic," like nabisco said.

My mom makes it as an intermediate step to homemade mac'n'cheese, it's basically your roux with sharp cheddar and whatever else melted into it. Then she has to beat us about the hands with her wooden spoon as we try to scoop it up with chips before she puts the pasta in.

But sitting, possibly lukewarm, on a restaurant table? I can hardly imagine.