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I slipped my thumb ring off my finger and into the Bosphorus the other day. It was the last of many steps in an ongoing, inevitable and long overdue process of de-Fierification. Call it an embracing of my inner Cosby. My sous-chef Steven gave me that ring a long time ago. Back in the day, we, all of us in the crew at the Supper Club got them, on the eve of a James Beard dinner event. A phalanx of famous, better known and (frankly, better all-around) chefs and their assistants were joining us in the kitchen the next night and we wanted something appropriately white trashy to set us apart, distinguish us as the home team. Like the skull and knife logo, I drew on our jackets for the occasion, the rings signified a sort of underdog unit pride.

We may have kind of sucked-but we worked hard, dammit-and if nothing else, habitually cranked out a helluva lot more dinners than anybody on the visiting team. By the time I dropped the thing in the water, the ring had outlived its usefulness. It went the way of my earring, joining-in one sense or another-my Dead Boys T-shirt, my telescoping billyclub and my crack pipe in some Davey Jones locker of once cherished but now abandoned objects. I think Steven will forgive me.

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* The Following Material Is for Parents of Small Children Only and Otherwise Incomprehensible if Not Offensive to Others

Picking on the Food Network has become too easy. It’s low hanging fruit.
So … this week, at least, I thought I’d look at another network. One I actually watch. And these days, when I’m home, the majority of my TV watching time is spent sitting on the living room floor watching Nick Jr. and Noggin. I take an interest in my child’s viewing habits. For all my earlier promises to myself that I’d limit her TV watching time to like–half an hour a day–that has been a hard policy to enforce. Denying a 2 year old when her lip starts to tremble and her face crumples, a look of utter betrayal in her eyes as she implores me: “Da Da? I want Backyardigans!” has proven to be too much for me.
It’s edumacational anyways, right?

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The camera people are walking on cocaine. Six tons of it. Thousands of kilos of un-cut pure rock. The air is thick with clouds of the stuff as men with machetes are hacking the kilo packages open, scattering it, spraying and spilling the stuff everywhere in white clouds. It looks like Tony Montana’s desktop, multiplied by many thousands. My shoes alone are caked with enough to keep an aging supermodel happy for weeks and the Director General of Panamanian security forces advises me to wash them carefully before flying home as the sniffer doggies at the airport are going to find me intriguing to say the least. I would also roundly fail a urine test he says. Just by standing here. In a few moments I will set all of it on fire. About this, I have mixed emotions, as an earlier version of myself would have found this …painful to watch.

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Thailand.

I think that of the shows being aired this summer, this is the best we’ve done so far. And it’s gonna be hard to top.
What I see in this Thailand show is the best producing, best photography and best editing in a single episode in quite some time . All the things the shooters have been working at–all the new equipment innovations, strategies and tactics–everything we’ve learned seemed to come to fruition on this one. Add to this mix an editor who saw the footage and understood right away not just what the road team had hoped for and what we’d been inspired by while in Thailand, but the possibilities for some really innovative visual storytelling.

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This week’s “Special” episode is a compendium of footage, shot over time around the world, celebrating the joys, delights (and occasional perils) of street food.
Basically? It’s a clip show.

The thing I’m proudest of on this show is not what’s seen on the screen. It’s what you hear on the soundtrack: Now, ordinarily, we can’t afford to use music from my favorite albums. Or ANY albums, for that matter. It’s a ridiculous amount of money to get the rights to even the most innocuous of songs. For a long time, even the singing of “Happy Birthday” during a scene–or played on a jukebox in the background, could cost you BIG money. We’re a tiny, five person crew, shooting entirely on small DV cameras with homemade jibs, using bags of rice and skateboards as dollies. We can’t afford even “Happy Birthday!”

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The show not about a place, or even places, per se. It’s certainly not a well-rounded introduction to the food scenes of Baltimore or Detroit or Buffalo. And it’s probably not what the respective chambers of commerce of these three fine, noble and deeply troubled American cities would like us to see right now. Baltimore, arguably, isn’t even really a “Rust Belt” city.
I like to think that tonight’s episode celebrates that particularly American character — who proudly survives and thrives in places like late era Baltimore, Detroit and Buffalo. And it does introduce a few quirky indigenous specialties.

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Thank you for the lovely fruit basket. My family and I arrived home very late last night to an empty refrigerator, with a jet-lagged, restive and hungry child agitating for food — only to find a festive and delicious assortment of fruit (from the very pricey Agata and Valentina no less).

My daughter quickly tore into the grapes, saving me from the humiliating business of doing an impromptu “Dancy Dance” from Yo Gabba Gabba (a strategy that has been known to work in situations of similar extremis). I thank you for your kindness to someone who has shown you no good reason for such a thing, your good humor — and for appreciating the New York Dolls.

I will honor the sentiments of your note and promise to see to it that no puppies are hurt, killed or otherwise inconvenienced during my remaining time on television. Given my frequent trips to countries where the line between “pets” and “food” can become somewhat …confusing, this is easier said than done — and might well lead to some socially awkward moments. But one good turn, I think, deserves another.

Best,

Anthony Bourdain

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