A Bloody Valentine to the World of Food and the People Who CookBy NPR
With several books on national best-seller lists and his own Emmy-nominated TV show, No Reservations, seasoned, salty chef-turned-food-writer Anthony Bourdain is a far different man from the one he was a decade ago, when he released his first memoir, Kitchen Confidential. In that book, readers were introduced to someone for whom the vices of the food service industry ? drugs, booze, late nights ? were seemingly as integral to his livelihood as butter is to a roux.
Fast-forward 10 years. Bourdain is now wealthy, married (to his second wife) and a father, and a guy worldly enough to start sentences with "I often feel this way when alone in Southeast Asian hotel bars." But while the formerly heroin-addicted wild man may have hung up his more dangerous knives ? and subsequently ended his assault on Rachael Ray ? rest assured that his prose is as sharp as ever. Profane, funny and slightly mean, the Bourdain in Medium Raw is still acerbic; he has just wisely discovered that in life, as in cooking, it's important to balance bitterness with hints of sweet.
Author Interview: Bourdain's 'Medium Raw' Grilling Of Celebrity Chefs June 16, 2010