Varifrank: The Bourdain Dilemma

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The Bourdain Dilemma

We spent this weekend in Napa Valley celebrating our anniversary. We spent our time there enjoying 65 degree temperatures, clear skies, entirely too much great wine and seeing hardly any of the normal polyester clad herd of middle aged wine poseurs that transforms that lovely valley into an impassible traffic jam during the normal vacation season.

Its times like this when I'm reminded of my relatives who are getting freezer burn in Idaho or getting soaked to the bone in Seattle and they who are always hounding me about "leaving California" as they have wisely done. Oh yes, you were right all along, I should leave Sunny California for Idaho or Seattle,blah,blah,blah,blah,bllllaagghhh.

Then you have to see it from my eyes, looking out across the vineyards, the verdant hills with a light cover of yellow mustard plants coming into bloom providing all that lovely contrast with just a whisp of fog on the hilltops, sitting on the veranda of the lodge, that there I was holding a glass of wine with fresh bread and cheese all made locally as the warm yellow sun hits my face - all in mid January, I'm thinking to myself "Oh sure, I'll call U-haul leave all this behind and move to those places that are right now under 4 feet of snow or where the rain hasnt stopped in 12 straight weeks..."

Are they nice places and beautiful in their own scope? Sure they are and I really like them, but they are simply not for me. To paraphrase Emma Goldman, "If I cant wear shorts outside in January, I dont want to be part of your revolution"

I'm a Californian, worse still, a Native Californian. Even worse, a 2nd generation Native Californian, which is like saying you are sasquatch, a mythical beast that many have heard of, but few have actually seen and is thus discredited out of hand by closed minded academic types.

And just so I set the right tone, I now will go ahead and show all of my "leper-stripes", you see, I'm the worst kind of Californian.

I'm a Southern Californian...! ( Cue the ominous music!)

Worse even still, as hard as many of you find this to believe, I really do like it here and I plan on staying, so when I'm visiting your state please dont lecture me about "not moving up here" as they do so frequently in Oregon. I know lots of people from California have moved to all the other western states, but you guys have to understand, those folks werent Californians either, they were from Texas or Ohio or somehwere else. They came to California and after 5 whole years, moved on to somewhere else. You are just the "flavor of the month" as soon as those folks see another rainbow in the sky, they will leave your part of the world too. When you lecture me at the gas station in Roseburg Oregon about how they dont want Californians up there, its cool, I get it. We tried telling the Oakies that too back in the 30's, it didnt work but we tried. You just have to take my word when I tell you I really am just visiting. Love Oregon, Love Washington, Love Idaho and yes, Love Nevada, but I'm really not going to move from here to wherever-the-hell else you think I cant wait to move to. Because the evidence is, I can wait and in all likelyhood I will continue to wait. This isnt just a place to park my trailer for a week like it is for some folks, its my home, what else am I going to do?

We got the opportunity to eat at Bouchon in Yountville, the pedestrian version of the famous French Laundry. Seeing as how the $240 per seat 'prix fixe' menu of the French Laundry was well beyond my means along with the almost two years it takes to get a reservation at that legendary establishment was also well beyond my patience level, Bouchon is the best choice for people like me who think that there is a limit to even the best of things.

Yes, of course I had the Boudin Noir, like you had to ask. How can you pass up blood sausage prepared in the French style? You can get steak and french fries anywhere, but blood sausage isnt exactly coming to a "drive up window near you" any time soon.

The restaurant and food were fantastic and I had a moment to contemplate what I call "the Bourdain Dilemma".

The dilemma is this. If all you eat is fast food or "banquet frozen fried chicken " or Hungryman dinners "fresh from your freezer", you think that is what food really tastes like. Your metric of food success is rather narrow, being that if it doesnt make you sick, then it must be "ok" and on occasion it might even be thought of as "good", depending on how hungry you are when you eat it. You eat at Chilis, Fridays or half a dozen other cant-tell-one-from-the-other places and no matter what you eat it tastes like day old deep fried chicken breading. Because you dont know any different, everything you are presented with in the modern world is "good", meaning only that didnt get sick, that it was served quickly and that it was probably covered in a thick yellow-ish cheese.

On the other hand, you take someone like Anthony Bourdain. He has a real dilemma, he actually knows what chicken tastes like and guess what, it doesnt taste like day old deep fried breading, which is less like chicken and more like that of a gymsock than you realise. He knows fresh food from microwaved crap but remember, he has to get through the day just like you do, only instead of seeing a place to eat every 10 feet in this country, what he sees is the equivalent of an open sewer with a big neon sign over it. He doesnt see food, he sees hell, dipped in batter and coming in packs of 6, 8 or 10 chunks at a time. Anthony Bourdain is the man who once said that the most disgusting thing he ever ate was the Mcnugget. You'll remember Bourdian is also the man who ate Warthog anus in Namibia. Mr. Bourdain has a dilemma because he knows good from bad and at times, this can be a burden. The Namibian Warthog anus? Well it made for good television anyway but if its all the same to you Mr. Bourdain, i'd slide the mcnugget down the list just a tad and slide up the fermented shark and warthog anus on this list instead.

I have a bit of this problem when it comes to seafood. I cannot eat seafood that is not fresh. Fresh seafood to me means I can see where the food was caught, and I can probably also see the fisherman who caught it and as little as an hour ago, the fish was on the fishermans hook. Thats the kind of seafood I can and do eat, but anything short of that I cant even stand the sight of it much less eat it. As a result, I dont eat alot of seafood. Unless I'm on Oregon or Washington of course...

Eating at Bouchon gives you just a small view of this burden. You are introduced to food you simply dont find on every corner. There are no 2-for-1 coupons at Bouchon. Its honest, good, solid, fresh food and its frightening because its simple and you can taste for the first time things that you thought you knew really well, but it turns out that you only have a very slight knowlege of. For example, I had French Onion Soup as a starter. This is not a difficult dish, but most people make it with pre-prepared beef stock that comes in cartons. Yes, its good when you make it that way over other options but when you eat it at Bouchon, its made with beef stock that is prepared on site - there are no cartons. It is fresh Onion Soup, its flavor is deep and dark and after eating their French Onion soup from that point on, all other French Onion soups are just some form of Campbells Condensed-Cream-of-what-was-probably-French-Onion-Soup-but-you-cant-tell-that-its-not-actually-wallpaper-paste Soup.

I now must decide to either learn to make it properly myself, or forgo my favorite soup.

Posted @ January 14, 2008 10:41 AM | Current Affairs

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Thanks for the post. It sounds very enjoyable. Of course, I'm in South Florida, and it's pretty nice this time year. It's the summers that are bad.

Posted by: Knox at January 14, 2008 01:16 PM

Great post. :-)

Seriously, when I moved to Germany I found there were no good Mexican restaurants, let alone New Mexican Santa Fe style restaurants.

So I had to learn how to make tortillas, sauces, how to get the ingredients to live.

Now I can't bear to think of Taco Smell. :-)

Great post, great blog, thanks!

Posted by: jfopie at January 14, 2008 02:35 PM

I don't suppose you'd post any pictures of those whisps of fog on the hilltops, will you?

Posted by: Some guy at January 14, 2008 10:10 PM

I didnt think to take any, or I would have certainly done just that.

Posted by: frank martin at January 15, 2008 06:51 AM

Mr Martin, so true about the difference between real food and "food-type products". You are especially lucky to be as close as you are to the best food region in the country. Can't beat the Bay Area and surrounds for great variety of outstanding, locally sourced foods. The level of expertise and appreciation is also very high, great wineries and chefs.

Would love to hear your impression of Ubuntu in Napa, currently said to be one of the very best dining experiences in the country. It's a vegeterian place with the highest standards, has been getting raves from non-vegetarians as well as the foodie elite. I know a talented young chef who left a great job to join the kitchen at Ubuntu because it was an extraordinary learning opportunity.

You are fortunate to live where you are, especially since your working arrangements do not require you to deal with the evil traffic day in and day out.

Posted by: Seppo at January 15, 2008 10:23 AM

> You'll remember Bourdian is also the man who ate Warthog anus in Namibia.

So, when he says "This tastes like ass", he really knows...?

Posted by: Vootie at January 20, 2008 08:50 AM

> Thanks for the post. It sounds very enjoyable. Of course, I'm in South Florida, and it's pretty nice this time year. It's the summers that are bad.

Knox, come join us up here in North Florida.

The traffic is better, the summers are better, and you're only 90-odd minutes from Jaxonville, Tampa, AND Orlando when you want one of those "big city" fixes.

Posted by: Vootie at January 20, 2008 08:52 AM