“In my worldview, food certainly plays a role, hopefully in bringing some kind of enlightenment and understanding and openness and appreciation of other cultures.” Anthony Bourdain became one of the most famous chefs probably living today, partly — in fact mostly — because of his writing and his reporting much more than because of his food. “Work, work, work, work, work.” And I think one of the defining images of Tony Bourdain that will live on is of him cracking President Obama up in a noodle shop in Vietnam. “This is killer.” They’re both so happy to be there. And you can tell that. And that was just not an image of a president eating street food that we had ever seen before. And Bourdain, when he was cooking, his food was classic, pretty upscale. When he went over to broadcasting, he abandoned that world completely. He really was not interested in what rich people were eating in fancy dining rooms. He was really interested in what people were cooking all over the world, making the best of what they had. And he definitely connected both of those traditions in a way that I don’t think anyone had ever done before. He really saw himself once he was a writer as someone whose job it was to poke the aristocracy in a very classic way. “I loathe in principle the idea of adhering to any orthodoxy or strict belief system, because my travels have shown me as I move from place to place that what I thought yesterday is, in fact, completely wrong, again and again.” His first TV show, “A Cook’s Tour,” was focused exclusively on food. “I think almost all modern chefs are impressed by Japanese presentation —” His more recent show that he was filming when he died is called “Parts Unknown.” It’s more of a travel show. There is a food aspect to it. But his mission — as he saw it — was to really give people access to places like Lagos, in Nigeria, or the night markets of Singapore. Places that were, as he thought of them, off the map. He brought them onto the map. “So back in Vietnam and all of the things I need for happiness: Low plastic stool — check. Tiny little plastic table — check. Ooh, something delicious in a bowl.” Bourdain was really smart. He was really brash. His appeal definitely was partly to men, who may previously not have thought of cooking as such a masculine activity. He was irretrievably masculine. “Because that’s the kind of guy I am.” Bourdain’s mother was a copy editor at The New York Times and he was always part of — in fact one of the first — of the new generation of more educated chefs who knew a lot about food and were good at talking about food. He had written, I believe, a couple of mystery novels before he published the article in the New Yorker that really made him famous. That formed the basis of “Kitchen Confidential,” which was his memoir of what it’s really like to work in a kitchen — “Welcome to my world.” — which was full of what some people consider really unappetizing details, but which were totally entrancing for people who were caught up in the idea of this rough and tumble, no holds barred, the idea that working in a kitchen was like being in a rock band and it was sweaty and it was loud and it was stressful. But in some way it made people — it brought people together. It made them better. It pulled their best work out of them. It was very intense the way that he described it. “You know, I wrote a book that, you know, I stand by and that it was an honest representation of what I saw, what I went through, what I, you know — the voices I heard and my own voice at the time. But I provide a validation for a kind of a meathead mentality, a bro, you know, sort of meathead, bro culture that, you know, has not been good, particularly for women.” Bourdain always called himself a classic bored New Jersey suburbs kid. He really tried to escape that as soon as he could, first through music and then through drug use. Lots of chefs, especially back in the ’80s, used cocaine really simply as a way to stay awake during 12-hour shifts. It was something that he was open about. It was something that he struggled with. I know that he quit multiple times and relapsed multiple times. In some ways, that was always in the background of his persona as a chef and it was also in the background of his persona as an individual, as someone who had been through the fire and survived. “I went from a guy, you know, broke, always been, had been broke, never insured, never owned anything, perpetually in debt, hardworking guy to overnight, the guy with the best job in the world.”