How often do we have to learn that the angry, ranting men on our screens aren't hiding happy, peaceful spirits behind the lights and makeup?

Was he angry? Didn't come through in the YGG clip.

It's really hard to come across as full of rage when you're next to Foofa.

And yet the yellow robot manages it.

I enjoyed Anthony Bourdain's show, and think of him as charming, slightly obnoxious, but generally more honest than most TV hosts (for whatever one can tell from the outside). I wouldn't describe him as angry or ranty.

I am very sad to see the news.

I still have to watch the episode where he was in my usual bar.

I read one of his books, where he described heavy heroin addiction in his youth, which can't improve one's odds. He was a good writer.

Are you guys kidding? The man's entire value proposition was "Watch me eat; listen to me (or read me on Twitter) insult people of whom you disapprove."

Agreed. Never saw him on TV but his books were definitely angry (and hilarious).

He went on to showcase foods of the world in his documentary series, and from what I'm seeing on Twitter was very respectful in how he approached it.

Flip is just jealous.

Flip is just angry.

But not yet hilarious.

8: I disagree. See also: http://grantland.com/hollywood-prospectus/anthony-bourdain-parts-unknown/

"By focusing on shared values, particularly food, Bourdain was able to illuminate the everyday life of a region that is all too easily overlooked in the choking haze of explosions and rhetoric. But it was his refusal to reward empty platitudes or neat resolutions that truly set Bourdain apart from all other televised talking heads. Though originally known for being an abrasive cook, Bourdain has brilliantly remade himself as an exceedingly polite guest. He arrives in each locale with a mind as empty as his stomach. The format of Parts Unknown is documentary but its messy heart is beautifully subjective. It believes in questions, not answers; appetite, not satisfaction. "

This seems like it might be worth sharing to the group: an app to help you manage urges to self-harm. Developed for a teenage mental health charity by a psychologist, and featured by the NHS.

He ranted, but I didn't think of him as angry. I thought it was two things.
1. He was the kind of person who liked to give other people crap and expected it back.
2. To quote Carrie from the other place: "One of the things the chefs he criticized typically had in common was that they all contributed to the divorce of food and culture. Take all the difficulty of preparation rituals away--turn cooking into a series of mindless slogans--and food doesn't mean anything anymore."

And just today there's a report the suicides in the US are up 25-30% since 1999.

There was a map by state and Vermont and New Hampshire were weird outliers for the East coast with increases of nearly 50%.

I was writing something else and then realized I was mixing him up with Gordon Ramsay.

Availability of guns in those states?

I know calling it depression is supposed to make us more empathetic about suicide than calling it "selfish asshole" or "mortal sin", and I think in large part it has. But I can't help but wonder if calling it depression is still "othering" it too much. Like we do with school shooters, they must be broken if they have done such a thing.

Maybe depression isn't always an uncontrollable mental state or a neurobiochemical problem. Maybe depression is sometimes a mostly-rational response to the fact that even from Bourdain's lofty vantage point, big chunks of the world still suck, large percentages of people are selfish and/or evil and/or dull, and long stretches of life are unpleasant and boring and sometimes waiting for the moments that make it all worthwhile seems like it's not worth it anymore.

No, he wasn't angry at everyone and everything all the time. But he definitely had his angry moments. The guy rewrote "Fistful of Dollars" as a comic book set in a dystopian future LA ruled by rival food gangs, and virtually the first scene is the hero beheading four irritating hipsters who insist on mixing the wasabi with the soy sauce when they're eating sushi (which is ruled to be justifiable homicide).

he wasn't angry at everyone and everything all the time.

Slacker.

Please tell me 21 is true.

Please tell me 21 is true.

Apparently so, though I wasn't aware of it until now.

It is!

Though actually that makes me sadder.

Omg, I could have been one of those hipsters. Scary.

You would have been fine, armed as you are with well-sharpened ceramic knives.

I'm supposed to be sharpening my ceramic knife? How does that even work? I'm doomed.

I'm sad that the only thing I really knew about Bourdain is that as a vegetarian I would have come in for scorn. (We irritating hipsters come in all kinds.) I guess there was a lot more to him.

I mildly approved of Bourdain before, but his stances after the Trump election and MeToo made me much more impressed. He didn't have to comment on either, but he did, loudly, in the right ways.

MeToo

I think I could be a vegan if I was allowed to consume animal products in cases of emergency and if somehow something could be both urgent enough to be an emergency and slow enough to let a sausage cure.

Talk about a fussy eater.

Doesn't he seem more like an autoerotic asphyxiation-accident sort of guy? That's how I'll choose to remember him.

Kitchen Confidential was good. Never saw his shows, but his persona seemed to be the...not sure of the word here...not quite asshole and not quite loudmouth, but something like that, with a big heart, which is definitely a type, and a type that probably does a fair bit of crying or drinking alone.

Don't stereotype white people.

Ogged subscribes to the inclusive or?

I really liked Kitchen Confidential. I saw about 5 minutes of one of his shows but I don't like programs where you just watch some white guy eat and then expound on what he's eating.

He was pretty young and in the middle of a bunch of projects. I wonder if he received a diagnosis.

I was also really surprised that Kate Spade was so young. My first KS handbag was...a very poorly-executed knockoff from Santee Alley. It was 1999.

his persona seemed to be the...not sure of the word here...not quite asshole and not quite loudmouth, but something like that, with a big heart, which is definitely a type, and a type that probably does a fair bit of crying or drinking alone.

The link at 24 notes that he said of himself that people might describe him as a "loud, egotistical, one-note asshole who's been cruising on the reputation of one obnoxious, over-testosteroned book for way too long and who should just shut the fuck up",

Which I think is an example of the persona you're describing.

I found his earliest writing persona irritating bc exemplifying tedious machismo of resto kitchens which was my own working life atmosphere from 16 to 31 or so, nearly all spent in the upscale lichens of Berkeley & SF. Including, yes, worker-owned collective where a colleague (male) once remarked in surprise at my taking a "high status" station bc unspoken obvious point a woman wtf? (and delightful other male colleague said Oh that's right dq you don't have a penis! God i miss dude #2, plus revenge of excellence, was conservatively 2000% better at station than dude #1)

BUT bourdain truly did evolve, first by publicly repeatedly championing the Mexicans without whom our entire food supply in the US would be utterly fucked, and then when the Weinstein shit hit the fan he ask the correct question - why did ALL THE WOMEN in my life never tell me about the egregious shit they were dealing with, what is it ABOUT ME that led to this and HOW CAN I CHANGE?

Feeling v sad so trying to focus on pleasurable things.

Never watched any of his shows, to be honest - but enjoyed watching him savage eg beard foundation from afar over years.

beard foundation

At first I assumed this was a reference to some kind of screen makeup or side effect thereof.

upscale lichens

Stupid rocks here just have regular ones.

Reading about his shows is bumming me out now, because he seems to have been very sincere about going out in the world and treating people we don't normally hear from on American TV with humility and respect.

Looks like I insta-kleptomnesiad that comment from Tony Karon's tweet. Also.

Upscale lichens are what first drew me to dairy Queen

Upscale, collectivist, locally-sourced, biodynamic lichens from your dq, guys. 😘

Was already shocked and saddened by Kate Spade, and now Anthony Bourdain. Oh, and the Ontario election results didn't exactly lift my mood. Not a good news week.

The shows were very entertaining, and always with a bit more of a smart political edge than you'd expect. A good writer too. I'm very sad, and completely shocked. Especially given that he seemed to have the most fun life of anyone in the world... still, I'm not sure we can infer it was depression/mental illness - is there any evidence for that?

I stay away from food writers in general because of the vegetarian thing, and so I stayed away from him. I appreciate the quotes and clips I saw people share about things like wanting to beat Henry Kissinger to death or taking Obama out to a little shop in Vietnam. He seems to have given a lot of very different friends of mine joy, and the suicide of anyone with a young child is really, really sad.

I always thought it was sadder when somebody with a just grown kid died. Because you did all the work before dying.

I guess maybe it's different if you are thinking about it from the perspective of the kid.

49: those elections are killing me. 76 PC, 40 NDP and 7 liberals. Where Tim's family is conservatives got 37.5% and the NDP got 34% but the Liberals got 24 or 27%. The provincial Liberals kind of stink. Wish the NDP had done better.

21 appears to be food snobbism on the order of eating your fish with the proper fork because that's what Lady Poggleglump says, based on one minute of asking the Google. I recommend it (both the Google and mixing your soy and wasabi).

To be fair, anything irritating hipsters do is ... irritating. To be even more fair, if I was in Japanese restaurant in Japan I'd do what the locals and/or sushi chef are doing*. One reference says chefs put a dollop of wasabi under the fish, for example, and then dip the un-wasabi'd fish side into the soy.

*Other than offing hipsters, that is.

What my mom does is put loads of wasabi and soy in the thing and dunk the sushi, which is just the worst. She is not a hipster.

"Parts Unknown" is now available for anybody who wants to open a colonoscopy shop.

put loads of wasabi and soy in the thing and dunk the sushi, which is just the worst.

Wait, this is bad? Its how I've always done it.

When the fish is average or you're eating a california roll, dunking in wasabi-saturated soy is totally fine. When it's good, do what the chef tells you, which is usually either add nothing, or lightly dip the fish side in pure soy.

|| Watching 4 baby foxes cavorting a few miles west of town. Maybe the world doesn't completely such. |>

Fortunate that I eat a lot more crap sushi than good sushi, then.

There's a style* of sushi not common in the US but apparently common in Japan where you don't add wasabi at all. I ate in a place like that a few months ago in southern California and it was fine. They had a sign explaining why they didn't provide wasabi to add yourself.

I'm not actually a huge fan of sushi, so I don't really care much about wasabi, not wasabi, or wasabi and soy sauce. I don't like mixing wasabi and soy sauce, but I didn't know it was frowned upon. I just don't like the taste.

* I guess it's the "traditional" style?

I've been mixing wasabi in soy sauce for 40 years and will continue to do so. A sushi place I like up in Whitefish has a sign up 'no sushi snobs.'

"21 appears to be food snobbism on the order of eating your fish with the proper fork because that's what Lady Poggleglump says, based on one minute of asking the Google"

Well, the professional chef must be wrong then!

If I remember, the point was that they mixed them up and drenched the sushi in it before even tasting: equivalent of Trump smothering his steaks in ketchup.

It's wasabi, and I'll soy if I want to.

God, the most insufferable part of the anti-Trump reaction is having to hear about his food choices, and how it deeply reveals his character. He could put ketchup on his bourbon for all it matters.

64.2. I'm quite sure the professional chef knew everything there was to know about every food eaten or dish prepared. Nil nisi and all that.

I put spray cheese on all my sushi and bourbon.

Anyway, I'm willing to bet that the sushi in Nebraska has more mayonnaise on it than the sushi in Japan.

I quite like sushi, but I don't like wasabi much at all. So, I never use it. I don't know what kind of non-hipster that makes me.

I don't much like horse-radish, either. FWIW.

"I'm quite sure the professional chef knew everything there was to know about every food eaten or dish prepared."

Well, apparently he would if he spent a minute on Google.

70: Honestly, mayonnaise might be the opposite of horseradish, but it is deeply disconcerting on sushi.

Sushi - rice and vinegar.
Mayonnaise - oil and vinegar.
Like, what's the big deal?

I've got this horseradish mustard that I use to excess (though not on sushi) that is my absolute favorite.

Like millions of tiny heated needles being driven into one's tongue and palate. The fucking best.

Also, Bourdain leaves one the enduring desire to

soak the entire range-top with brandy and ignite it, causing a huge, napalm-like fireball to rush up into the hoods--just like in the movie when the tree line goes up.

I've never knowingly used mayo with sushi. I don't like mayo much, either.

Soy, chilli, japanese pickes, vinegar, citrus etc love them all. Mayo is too greasy, and horseradish/wasabi is just not the kind of heat (nose heat) that I like. Small anounts fine.

My wife, otoh, loves wasabi.

My favorite food that I haven't had in 20 years is prawn cocktail Skips. I'm wondering how 40-something me would like them.

At my office cafeteria yesterday they had a raw bar with oysters 3 for $2.05. I had to control myself and only ordered six.

I thought you had to wait for a month with an 'r' in it.

My brother taught me to eat sushi which was mix soy and wasabi and dip so I'll blame my cretinism on him.
Ketchup plus wasabi is a passable substitute for cocktail sauce.

You can eat sushi with mayonnaise in Japan (salmon mayo, shrimp with mayo and cheese, and so on) in cheap conveyor-belt sushi restaurants. As they cater to families with young children, you can also watch passing horrors like hamburger nigiri with mayonnaise and demiglace sauce, inari stuffed with meat, and frankfurter temaki with mustard.

More people from Japan should spend time in Nebraska.

Re 77: You've never had Dynamite?

I take some pride in not generally being drawn in by celebrity, and so I'm surprised at how affected I am by Bourdain's suicide. I wasn't even a superfan or anything; I read and liked Kitchen Confidential in the early aughts and have seen fewer than 5 episodes of any of his shows (including the Obama one in Viet Nam) and probably know him better from the odd Fresh Air interview, etc., whenever he had a new project to flog. But his death feels to me a bit like Prince's; especially hard to take because you knew he still had a lot in him. I would really have liked to see what either would do as old guys.

I think what I relate to so much (more than I like to admit) is that he wore on his sleeve the sense that he pissed away a bunch of his early adult life and knew how lucky he was to have his late success. He grew, and he knew it, and he talked about it, and seemed to be trying hard to keep growing. For someone whose initial success was based on a "brash/bad-boy/angry" persona, who probably could have kept dining out on that indefinitely, to wear his regrets and reconsiderations so publicly, impresses me. And after a day of reading stories and reflections from people who actually knew him, boy, he really seems like a genuine mensch.

And since this is now the how-to-eat-sushi thread, I want to say that 55 gets it right. When I was in Japan, I did the no-mixing, dip the fish in tamari thing, because when in Rome and suchlike. But I learned to eat sushi by mixing the entire blob of wasabi into tamari and then using enough to trigger that scalp-crawling-off-my-head sensation, one of the best food sensations ever, and anyone who wants to tell me that's wrong can fuck right off. Even zombie Bourdain.

||
This was bound to happen eventually, but so depressing:
WaPo: A family was separated at the border, and this distraught father took his own life.
|>

Right alongside the deported DREAMer from Iowa who was murdered 3 weeks after being sent to Mexico.