Monday, June 1, 2009

I Love A Good Lecture!

Anthony Bourdain had a speaking engagement at the Flint Center in Cupertino, and I was there baby! I can prove it.

Oh my god, there he is!

This photo may be slightly clearer...maybe [I didn't take this one, by the way]


What an entertaining evening! AB is interesting, engaging, intelligent, honest and not afraid to be pretty damn candid - love it!

In addition to being quite an accomplished chef in his own right, AB is also an author and host of No Reservations on the Travel Channel. To some he may be considered a bit of an acquired taste, but I like to think to many more he is a refreshingly honest voice in today's food culture in this country.

Some of the highlights:

Thinks Vegetarianism is fundamentally just rude, and wasn't afraid to say so as he supposed the veges in the audience didn't have enough strength to get too angry. The idea that someone cooked for you, extended their hospitality and generosity and then would have that refused seems horrible rude to AB. [This was ultimately why my attempts at vegetarianism failed. When applying it around others, I felt awkward and rude all the time.]

He is not a huge fan of Guy Fieri and thinks his bling makes it virtually impossible for sanitary food handling to be taking place. [Something to think about there people...]

IS a Mario Batali fan. [Bravo!]

Considers Sandra Lee's Kwanzaa cake one of the most painful television pieces to ever hit Food Network. [I agree; it is horrible -- I keep waiting for her to make a formal apology. It really is an all new low on her "cooking".]

AB resides in New York, but Vietnam is in his top five places he would want to live. [You just don't hear about people falling in love with Vietnam all that often.]


4 comments:

shannon said...

Sandra Lee's cake was the most butt ugly cake I've ever seen. That must have been one of her first shows because she really kinda sucked on that one.

Daniella said...

Umm.....you sound like a Sandra fan Shannon. Say it isn't so!! I am going to need one of her horrible cocktails to go into blood sugar shock and block this out.

shannon said...

Oh wait, let me do a tablescape first! Rick likes her, for obvious blond, big boob reasons. Whatever...

Daniella said...

I wonder if that is how she is on the air at all because Rick is not alone in his fanship for those reasons. Hmmm...