Journeyman Chef, Manhattan resident, punk music enthusiast and best selling author Anthony Bourdain comes to Bogota this August, just don't mention Billy Joel
Food lovers and travel enthusiasts all over Bogota and Colombia are abuzz with the news that the New York celebrity chef (he probably wouldn’t like the term but has come to terms with it) is gracing the capital this August.
Renowned for his irreverent wit, dead pan television voice and insightful and often startlingly blunt observations, Bourdain is set to share an hour and a half discussing the common denominators that unite all great world kitchens followed by a questions and answers period with an adoring public in the Gonzalo de Jimenez de Quesada Conference Centre.
Bourdain himself is probably more familiar with the illicit products that Colombia has to offer rather than its cuisine having been an unrepentant consumer in former hell-raising years.
Bogotanos familiar with Bourdain will hope that he will combine his unique blend of kitchen wisdom and barstool philosophy as shown on his current TV show Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations (The Travel Channel) with recipes from far flung places and exotic locales.
With three decades of experience in the food business the frighteningly well read Bourdain – who routinely quotes or refers to works by Graham Greene, Joseph Conrad and Henry Miller - has every right to make his observations and expect your full attention.
Bourdain has said of being a good cook/ preparing a good meal:
“You need the determination to go on – even after you’ve scorched the first batch of stew, burned the sauce, mutilated the fish filet and lopped off a hunk of fingertip.”
Sometimes referred to as the “Culinary Indiana Jones” Bourdain has had his fair share of scrapes with some dishes unfit for human consumption, sheep testicles, raw seal eyeball, cobra and a warthog rectum and will now be taking on Colombian cuisine.
One hopes that the event organisers will bring along, aside from the staple favourite Ajiaco soup, some treats from the Santander region such as the Hormigas Culonas Tostaditas – toasted fat bottomed ants. These huge flying ants have been smoked out of their hills and once stripped of their wings are toasted up by the thousand making for a tasty if not interesting and unusual snack.
Oh yes, the Billy Joel reference: Bourdain is vehement in his hatred for the man’s music.
Anthony Bourdain will be at the GONZALO JIMENEZ DE QUESADA Conference Centre on August 21, 2007.
Some non fiction works by Anthony Bourdain
Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly (2000)
A Cook’s Tour (2001)
The Nasty Bits (2006)
