A Cook's Tour: Global Adventures in Extreme Cuisine

Anthony Bourdain (2002)

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THE A5 BOOK REVIEW

One of our favorite recommendations is the book written by famous chef and author Anthony Bourdain - A Cook’s Tour: Global Adventures in Extreme Cuisines. Cooking and dining traditions are often one of the best settings to better understand another culture, and Bourdain does an amazing job using food (and alcohol) to really get to know the local side of the places he visits. His adventures take him to Portugal, France, Vietnam, Russia, Morocco, Japan, Cambodia, Mexico, Spain and closer to home, the legendary French Laundry restaurant in Napa Valley. It is a funny book, extremely well written, with a reverence for exploring the world and of course for the joy of the perfect meal. The book was made into a television series of the same name for the Food Network, featuring Bourdain as the host.

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ABOUT ANTHONY BOURDAIN

Anthony Bourdain was a popular American chef, author and television personality best known for the candid, hilarious Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly, a shocking look into the reality of restaurant kitchens. He has written two food-related travelogues, A Cook’s Tour and No Reservations, both which follow his television shows of the same names. Bourdain tragically committed suicide in 2018.

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GREAT QUOTES FROM A COOK'S TOUR: GLOBAL ADVENTURES IN EXTREME CUISINE

“Context and memory play powerful roles in all the truly great meals in one's life. I mean, lets face it: when you're eating simple barbecue under a palm tree, and you feel sand between your toes, samba music is playing softly in the background, waves are lapping at the shore a few yards off, a gentle breeze is cooling the sweat on the back of your neck at the hairline, and looking across the table, past the column of empty Red Stripes at the dreamy expression on your companion's face, you realize that in half an hour you're probably going to be having sex on clean white hotel sheets, that grilled chicken leg suddenly tastes a hell of a lot better.”

INTERESTING FACTS & LINKS:

Read "Extreme Cuisine," Sam Sifton's 2001 review of A Cook's Tour at The New York Times
Anthony Bourdain was the guest editor for the 2008 edition of The Best American Travel Writing series.
This book is truly one of our recommendations as the best of the best in travel writing. Click here to see the full list of our top recommendations.