I hear his voice in the kitchen, too. Anthony Bourdain was the best food writer of this century. When he disappeared from our TV screens, so did great food TV. There are pleasant hosts, informative hosts, high-rating, engaging hosts, but besides Bourdain, they are all “okay”. He cared about the writing as much as the food, revered chefs, skewered pretension and hypocrisy (including his own), and never broke his first rule of food writing:  Don’t Be Boring.

And he evolved. The surly prick of Kitchen Confidential turns reflective and forgiving in Medium Raw. His filmed travel essays went deeper. He seemed like less of a douche the more famous he got — the reverse of what we expect, no?

Now I pass a mural portrait of Anthony Bourdain on Wilshire Blvd. and feel like he’s protective, disapproving, and encouraging in one look. Up he goes on the altar.

What we eat is who we are.

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