Quotes by Anthony Bourdain

If Im an advocate for anything, its to move. As far as you can, as much as you can. Across the ocean, or simply across the river. The extent to which you can walk in someone elses shoes or at least eat their food, its a plus for everybody.Open your mind, get up off the couch, move.

Food is everything we are. Its an extension of nationalist feeling, ethnic feeling, your personal history, your province, your region, your tribe, your grandma. Its inseparable from those from the get-go.

your body is not a temple, its an amusement park. Enjoy the ride.

Vegetarians, and their Hezbollah-like splinter faction, the vegans ... are the enemy of everything good and decent in the human spirit.

Ive long believed that good food, good eating, is all about risk. Whether were talking about unpasteurized Stilton, raw oysters or working for organized crime associates, food, for me, has always been an adventure

Vegetarians, and their Hezbollah-like splinter-faction, the vegans, are a persistent irritant to any chef worth a damn. To me, life without veal stock, pork fat, sausage, organ meat, demi-glace, or even stinky cheese is a life not worth living. Vegetarians are the enemy of everything good and decent in the human spirit, an affront to all I stand for, the pure enjoyment of food. The body, these waterheads imagine, is a temple that should not be polluted by animal protein. Its healthier, they insist, though every vegetarian waiter Ive worked with is brought down by any rumor of a cold. Oh, Ill accomodate them, Ill rummage around for something to feed them, for a vegetarian plate, if called on to do so. Fourteen dollars for a few slices of grilled eggplant and zucchini suits my food cost fine.

We know, for instance, that there is a direct, inverse relationship between frequency of family meals and social problems. Bluntly stated, members of families who eat together regularly are statistically less likely to stick up liquor stores, blow up meth labs, give birth to crack babies, commit suicide, or make donkey porn. If Little Timmy had just had more meatloaf, he might not have grown up to fill chest freezers with Cub Scout parts.

Good food is very often, even most often, simple food.

I lurched away from the table after a few hours feeling like Elvis in Vegas - fat, drugged, and completely out of it.

To me, life without veal stock, pork fat, sausage, organ meat, demi-glace, or even stinky cheese is a life not worth living.

That without experimentation, a willingness to ask questions and try new things, we shall surely become static, repetitive, moribund.

In another telling anomaly of the meat-grinding business, many of the larger slaughterhouses will sell their product only to grinders who agree to not test their product for E. coli contamination--until after its run through a grinder with a whole bunch of other meat from other sources...Its like demanding of a date that she have unprotected sex with four or five other guys immediately before sleeping with you--just so she cant point the finger directly at you should she later test positive for clap.

For a moment, or a second, the pinched expressions of the cynical, world-weary, throat-cutting, miserable bastards weve all had to become disappears, when were confronted with something as simple as a plate of food.

A sampler of Englands hottest chefs would include a mostly hairless young blond lad named Jamie Oliver, who is referred to as the Naked Chef. As best as I can comprehend, hes a really rich guy who pretends he scoots around on a Vespa, hangs out in some East End cold-water flat, and cooks green curry for his mates. Hes a TV chef, so few actually eat his food. Ive never seen him naked. I believe the Naked refers to his simple, straightforward, unadorned food; though I gather that a great number of matronly housewives would like to believe otherwise. Every time I watch his show, I want to go back in time and bully him at school.

Im asked a lot what the best thing about cooking for a living is. And its this: to be a part of a subculture. To be part of a historical continuum, a secret society with its own language and customs. To enjoy the instant gratification of making something good with ones hands--using all ones senses. It can be, at times, the purest and most unselfish way of giving pleasure (thought oral sex has to be a close second).

So I didnt have time to craft artful lies and evasions even if Id wanted to.

Garlic is divine. Few food items can taste so many distinct ways, handled correctly. Misuse of garlic is a crime. Old garlic, burnt garlic, garlic cut too long ago and garlic that has been tragically smashed through one of those abominations, the garlic press, are all disgusting. Please treat your garlic with respect. Sliver it for pasta, like you saw in Goodfellas; dont burn it. Smash it, with the flat of your knife blade if you like, but dont put it through a press. I dont know what that junk is that squeezes out the end of those things, but it aint garlic. And try roasting garlic. It gets mellower and sweeter if you roast it whole, still on the clove, to be squeezed out later when its soft and brown. Nothing will permeate your food more irrevocably and irreparably than burnt or rancid garlic. Avoid at all costs that vile spew you see rotting in oil in screw-top jars. Too lazy to peel fresh? You dont deserve to eat garlic.

Garlic is divine. Few food items can taste so many distinct ways, handled correctly. Misuse of garlic is a crime...Please, treat your garlic with respect...Avoid at all costs that vile spew you see rotting in oil in screwtop jars. Too lazy to peel fresh? You dont deserve to eat garlic.

I am not a fan of people who abuse service staff. In fact, I find it intolerable. It’s an unpardonable sin as far as I’m concerned, taking out personal business or some other kind of dissatisfaction on a waiter or busboy.

Dont lie about it. You made a mistake. Admit it and move on. Just dont do it again. Ever